An Industry in Luxury Bed Mattresses Appears - for the Newly Rich Luxury Customer
The mattress industry today has everything it needs to appeal to exotic tastes. They build their mattresses with special alloy springs, write reams about the stuffing they use, the layers they place in there, and of course the stitching and the casing material they pick. For each exotic choice in stuffing or materials they make for you, they can choose to charge you thousands extra, and claim a scientific benefit (the benefit being real or imaginary as the case may be). And if the company that sells the bed mattresses comes from far away, say Europe or Asia, so much the better.
Consider Hastens, the Swedish manufacturer (or should I say creator) of extra luxury bed mattresses. They actually charge more than $50,000 for each "creation", and they say that they make them with horsehair whose softness can knock you out in bed. Another company from Italy called matinee flex, that only sells its wares through special hand-picked retailers in this country, sells its creations for about $25,000 each. I find myself thinking that the days of the $800 haircut have perhaps not really left us. It now looks like to the rich, even in a recession like this, spending as much on a mattress as could keep a family in the projects alive for a couple of years, isn't that much of a stretch.
As depressing as unemployment and a recession are for far too many families in this country, you do have to realize that families that make a quarter-million dollars a year are the fastest growing bracket of any, around. Those families would be intrigued, and they would want something that could set them apart from the hoi polloi (that's us). It would appear that luxury marketers have just made products for the bed, mattresses and comforters, their own; the bed seems to be an area that has curiously beenunder the luxury marketer's radar so far, and now, it's been discovered. Consumers of luxury goods have so far been catered to with more than enough choice in clothes and accessories, cars and kitchenware, even bathroom equipment and home gyms. The bedroom is an area that hasn't received as much focus so far; so in they come with their fancy claims.
These bed mattresses certainly are extremely comfortable and inviting. But are they any better than the ones that cost a mere $5000 or less? Most of us do sleep well in whatever we have at home. In Japan, the custom has been to sleep on the floor traditionally, and who's to say that they suffer for it? But there is something to buying a new bed; if you have kept the same old bed mattresses for more than ten years, it is quite possible that a new one would do you a world of good. A saggy and weak bed, mattress or pillow can irritate the body. But apart from that, if you find yourself thinking that that perfect luxury mattress that promises to help with your sleep problems sounds like just the thing, they are probably just getting you to drink too much of their Kool-Aid.