With the recent death of Ed Lilly, the former CEO of Serta Inc., another bedding giant has exited the stage. The industry mourns his death. And I say farewell to a man I admired, an important mentor in my career.
One of the benefits of my long tenure in Mattressville is that I’ve been able to work with many talented bedding leaders who have moved their companies and the industry forward. I’ve been saddened to see the deaths of some of the industry’s leading lights, but I count it as a blessing that I can reflect on their careers and salute their accomplishments.
I planned to offer this tribute at the celebration of life event that Lilly’s family held for him in St. Charles, Illinois, late last month, but a rare snowstorm in High Point kept me home. Here’s what I would have said at that event.
I first met Ed Lilly early in my bedding career, which started in the mid-1980s. I don’t remember when we first met—perhaps at Sealy’s headquarters in downtown Chicago in the 1980s—but I worked with him closely throughout his tenure at Serta, where he was the CEO from 1990 to 2004.
I remember watching him thoughtfully lay out Serta’s strategy on a whiteboard in his office in Itasca, just outside Chicago. He had the calm, confident air of a college professor.
I remember his unrelenting campaign to invest in the Serta brand, building awareness and brand recognition as he steadily built Serta’s revenues. He pushed hard for Serta’s licensees to invest in their brand, sometimes meeting resistance, but remaining steadfast in his belief that those investments were critical to Serta’s future. And they were.
I remember the strong team of professionals that he surrounded himself with at Serta, a group that included Mark Quinn, Alan Eisenberg, John Rachid, Al Klancnik, Jeff Van Tuyle, Bob Sabalaskey, and Susan Ebaugh, among many others. He was an inspirational leader for the men and women on team Serta, a team he nurtured with his business-building talents.
I remember the leadership position that Serta took when fire-resistant mattresses were mandated by a new federal regulation. Serta was the first bedding major to embrace those standards, before it was required to do so. That was the right thing to do, Lilly told me. He was correct.
He and Susan Ebaugh founded Lilly Management Group after they left Serta in 2004, and I watched that company quickly gain traction in the marketplace with its FR expertise and the public relations skills that Ebaugh brought to the business. Bob Sabalaskey leads Lilly Management Group today.
And I remember the many meetings and meals that I shared with Lilly and key members of the Serta team, including a relaxed dinner with Ed and Susan at the Green Valley Grill in Greensboro back in the days when Serta exhibited at the High Point Market.
In 2017, I led an industry tribute to Lilly at the Furniture Today Bedding Conference that I founded more than a decade earlier. It was wonderful to see Lilly receiving the recognition he richly deserved for his distinguished career as the applause for him echoed through the meeting room. That would be the last time I saw him. I’m glad we shared that high note.
Now he’s gone, joining a list of bedding giants that includes Howard Haas and Ernie Wuliger of Sealy, Roy Unger of Serta, and Kevin Toman of Serta and Englander. I knew them all, sat in their offices, met them on the road, and learned leadership lessons from them. Their personalities, professionalism and drive propelled their brands forward. We may never see another group of leaders quite like them.
During Lilly’s tenure at Serta, with Ebaugh serving as chief brand officer, Serta launched the iconic Counting Sheep campaign and also introduced a memorable tag line, “We Make the World’s Best Mattress.”
A few days after Lilly’s death on Dec. 12, I was talking on my cell phone with his wife, Nancy, as I began gathering my thoughts for the obituary I would soon write.
Sitting in my car in a remote parking lot in High Point, I told Nancy about the impact of the Counting Sheep and the “World’s Best Mattress” campaigns. At that very moment, a Serta truck cruised by on the road before me. I smiled as I saw the message emblazoned on the side of the truck: “We Make the World’s Best Mattress.”
Thanks, Ed, for sending that truck my way. Thank you for being a mentor, and for showing me what a great mattress leader can accomplish. I hope you are enjoying your heavenly rest.
