After researching the luxury bedding market online, it’s clear that there’s no definitive data on just how much the category will grow this year. But it will grow because of several factors, including higher disposable incomes, an aging population and more new homes built, to name a few.
Talking to members of the bedding industry, there’s a strong case as to why premium bedding products may be a solution to low foot traffic.
Kurt Ling, co-founder of Posh+Lavish, says there’s a luxury opportunity in the mattress category that people haven’t fully understood yet.
“Luxury is not more and more of the same,” he says. “We still run into retailers daily whose high-end brands are Posturepedic and Tempur-Pedic. Those are good brands, but at the end of the day they are not remotely what the luxury of business is.”
He suggests that in order to understand luxury, retailers need to go beyond $2,000 mattresses and make more from margins.
“If the average industry margin is 55% and you can sell somebody a $2,000 bed, you just made yourself about $1,200 bucks,” he explains. “If you can sell somebody a $10,000 bed, you just made nearly $7,000 and that’s one sale. That’s the amazing thing about luxury — if a retailer can sell one of those a week or a couple of those a month, it will change their life.”
There’s a way to present mattresses and sleep systems in a way that retailers can sell a $10,000 mattress to somebody who was coming in just for a $1,200 one, Ling says. And that’s the way that retailers are increasing their sales, especially in a time of low foot traffic.
“That luxury message goes twofold,” he says. “It’s how you increase traffic, but also how you build trust in your brand through presentation and truly helping the person get a better night’s sleep.”
He points out that one of the greatest misconceptions about luxury in our category is that there’s a luxury customer out there who’s thinking they’re going out to spend $10,000 on a mattress. “That’s just not how the category works,” he says. “It’s about conversion — it always has been.”
Mark Quinn, Shifman’s senior vice president of sales and marketing, says he thinks the luxury category is more crowded than ever right now.
“But here’s the thing, you can’t just make a bed and spec it with some exotic fibers and call it handmade,” he explains. “If you’re going to effectively serve that audience, then it is the attention to detail that matters the most. It is the little something extra that you bring to the table.”
Quinn adds that you “can’t sell $10,000 beds if you aren’t nailing the details. It’s the people that get those things right that are going to win in this space. And I think customers are more than willing to spend the money if you earn that from them through what you put out in the market. I would tell you that there are a lot of pretenders in the luxury mattress space.”
Many companies — who will not be named — claim they are luxury but simply do not compare to brands like Shifman, Posh+Lavish, King Koil, E.S. Kluft and others.
“We’re launching two programs, 1893, which is when we were founded. It will include three beds over $10,000. Our other collection we’re calling Timeless. Each bed is hand-signed by every single person who worked on it in a factory.”
Talking to retailers across the country, the premium strategy works and will grow steadily over the next 10 years. It may seem contradictory to try and sell higher-priced beds when consumers are worried about inflation, tariffs and other economic challenges. But it’s a category that makes sense, and it’s going to become more prevalent over this coming year
One research report by Cognitive Market Research suggests that the global luxury and premium mattress market will expand at a compound annual growth rate of 5.50% from 2023 to 2030.
“The demand for luxury and premium mattresses is rising due to increasing disposable incomes, an aging population, a surge in the number of homes built for single-occupancy and nuclear families, an enormous shift in consumer lifestyles and a surge in the number of new homes built,” the report reads.
The value of a mattress should not be understated. It’s one of the most used pieces of furniture a person owns, and people spend a third of their lives sleeping. With the right presentation, story and attention to detail, luxury products can be a winning category for the bedding industry in 2025.
