Retailers and manufacturers were pleasantly surprised by the success of the recent Memorial Day holiday. As the first holiday of the summer selling season, this could be a sign of how the rest of the summer selling season will go.
We reached out to a few manufacturers and retailers to see if they think the rest of the season will be successful, and most are cautiously optimistic that there could be continued success.
David Binke, CEO of King Koil, says Memorial Day was exceptional.
“We went into Memorial Day up a little over 50% for the year to date,” he says. “I’m optimistic for the whole summer. July 4 isn’t traditionally as strong as Memorial Day, and Labor Day is usually even better.”
He says there are many other things that seem to be better today than they were six months ago, but the key is interest rates.
“If there are any adjustments in interest rates then business should skyrocket,” he says. “When people refinance and move, that’s the biggest driver of the mattress business, in my opinion. So if interest rates come down during the course of the summer, even a little bit, I think the season is going to be outstanding. I’m forecasting a 28%-30% increase through Labor Day.”
Nick Bates, CEO of Spring Air International, says his company also had a successful Memorial Day. He adds that the bedding industry is seeing peaks and valleys right now, but sales holidays can help.
“Some retailers I’ve heard from go up and then flat, and it repeats,” he says. “I’ve been saying this for a while: We’re back to holiday sales selling. These holidays, which we’ve forgotten about since Covid, are back because people care. We need to make promotions to help our retailers drive that consumer traffic.”
One of the promotions is based on the minimum advertised pricing and allows retailers to run promotions around relaxing the MAP.
“We had a different national program where our copper mattresses were on sale for three weeks only,” he explains. “That’s where we started to see some wins. We’re giving away free pillows and sheets and running sales that help our retailers not only close but also hold margins even at discounted prices.”
Steve Karns, vice president of sales at Bedding Industries of America, agrees that sales holidays are back, but he doesn’t think this will be record-breaking summer sales season. He says some smaller retailers pulled back their advertising this year and let the bigger retailers like Mattress Firm and Purple get people thinking about mattresses. But he has some suggestions of how to prepare for the upcoming sales holidays.
“In conversations that I have now with retailers, the best strategy is building an internet and social media presence,” he says. “Smaller retailers can’t compete with the big-box stores on TV ads so you have to attack in a different way, and this is something that’s affordable. I’ve seen some guys get super creative, especially with their Facebook posts, and they’re fun to watch.”
Many of these retailers are also local entrepreneurs who are trying to give back to their community, he adds, and that’s another separation factor that can help smaller retailers compete.
Jeff Giagnocavo, co-owner of Gardner’s Mattress & More in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, says his store’s advertising shifted this year, and he found that financing was a popular option.
“I think it’s on the uptick and I feel good about presenting and offering it,” he says. “I’ve trained our team to break down the financing and explain to the customer what would make sense by doing the math. If they owe interest, we don’t get that money and their bed doesn’t get better, so we want to help them pay it off the best way they can.”
Greg Jent, co-owner of Discount Mattress Outlet in Bowling Green, Kentucky, says he didn’t put much into marketing for his two stores because they aren’t as dependent on Memorial Day as some other retailers.
“We’ve had the benefit of piggybacking off of other retailers’ marketing, and we did some good business off of it,” he says.
Jent is optimistic for the remainder of the summer selling season, but he says he’s stopped trying to make predictions because everything is unpredictable right now.
“There’s still a lot of uncertainty out there, both with consumers and with retailers, and that uncertainty leaves things a little more unpredictable than they might be in a normal time,” he says. “We don’t know what’s going to happen this time next month. You just have to roll with it day to day and see how it goes.”
