Below is a link to a photo gallery of our mattress assembly process. It will help you to understand the steps involved in assembling a latex mattress kit; and help you to visualize what is being described in the review.
http://mvpinboynton.smugmug.com/gallery/2287645
I had decided that it was time to look for a new mattress. Our current seven year old Sterns & Foster pillow top was not as comfortable as it once was; and my wife was having difficulty finding a comfortable position to sleep in. She has back and shoulder issues that kept her waking up and turning a lot at night. I sleep primarily on my back because my shoulders were getting sore if I slept on them too long. After a lot of research on this forum and checking out mattresses at numerous retailers in our area in South Florida, I decided to order a SleepEZ Select Sleep 10,000 in the standard Soft, Medium and Firm configuration. The main factors in my selection were price, excellent reviews on the product and numerous glowing reviews on the service level of SleepEZ. I was quite amazed that there were no negative reviews on SleepEZ. Quite unusual for any product. During the decision making process I was focusing a lot on the return policies of the various on-line vendors, since I thought that I might not like latex, although unlikely. Flobeds had the best return policy, but their initial mattress cost was quite a bit higher. I finally decided to go with the sure savings rather than possible savings if I had to return it. The cost for the king size mattress was $1,325 plus $75 for shipping. This was less than half the price of other latex mattresses we had looked at and there was no sales tax.
I called Shawn at SleepEZ to order the mattress on a Saturday after my wife told me she loved the feel of the latex mattress we tried out at our local City Mattress store. He told me that it should ship out in 3 days; and sure enough I got my tracking numbers on Wednesday afternoon. Due to the Christmas Holiday, FedEx said it would take 7 days to get to our house. Shawn said it normally takes 6 days to get to Florida, but he assumed it would be longer due to the Christmas holiday. Sure enough it arrived right on time. Once I had ordered this mattress, I really started to notice the pressure points on my old mattress. I was really looking forward to seeing if the latex would solve my wife's sleeping issues and help me to be able to spend more time sleeping on my side.
When I walked in the house, I saw the three 15” X 15” X 36” boxes waiting for me. Each box was 40 pounds, so they were easy to move around. From what I had read on this forum, I was expecting a major challenge to get the wrappings off of the latex. It turned out to be easier than getting the staples out of the boxes. SleepEZ really packs these babies securely. After a box is opened there appears to be a cocoon of plastic wrap sitting in it. When you tip the box over and let the cocoon fall onto the floor, it kind of springs back like a rubber ball. I guess that makes sense since it is rubber.
Cutting the plastic tape on the outer clear wrapping was very easy. I then sliced the wrapping to get to the latex with a black garbage bag looking material on it. As soon as it was free of the outer wrapping, the latex expanded with an air sucking sound. It looked like a big sandwich with a black wrapping on it. The black wrapping came off easily to reveal the latex layer. The first box I opened said that the mattress cover was in it. Sure enough sandwiched between the folded over latex was the cover with three zippered sides.
My wife helped me lay it out the one sided mattress cover over our existing foundation. SleepEZ uses a cover with only three zippered sides. Some kit companies use one that has four zippered sides where the whole top can come off. Shawn said that they had some problems when they were using the four zippered side cover and had no issues with this one. Since I don't plan on taking the cover off, it didn't make any difference to me. It does seem reasonable though that the less zipper the better. With the way our bed sits, it was easier to leave the cover flap at the foot of the bed rather than the head. Some people pull the cover down over the platform to keep the cover out of the way. Leaving the sides up worked fine for us. This wasn't a big deal, but it meant that the SleepEZ label could not be seen.
Each of the three layers in the Model 10,000 is 2.8 inches deep. Since my wife and I both wanted a plusher feel rather than firm, each of the layers, which can come in two sides, were glued together. It made the layer a little more difficult to maneuver. We put down the firm layer (38-40 ILD) first. It was a challenge to move it to the proper position, because we hadn't gotten the knack of moving the latex around. As others had said, it didn't seem like there was any way that three pieces would fit into the cover and still be able to zip it. It seemed like the cover wasn't wide enough either; but that was apparently caused by us not being able to stretch the bottom fully until we had a layer inserted. I kept reassuring my wife that everyone felt this way when they start the assembly process. I was crossing my fingers hoping I was right. It didn't look big enough. But I had faith.
When we put down the medium layer (30-32 ILD), it got into position much easier. Probably because it just needed to match up to the bottom layer; and we had figured how to shake the latex to move it. The final soft layer (22-24 ILD) was a piece of cake to put on top, since we had now become latex layer mover experts. We could see that it would take a little stuffing to get the zipper closed, but much less of a hassle than we had expected. The zipping process went very fast. The cover was a perfect fit.
The total assembly took about 40 minutes. It took longer because I was taking a lot of pictures for this review. I was quite pleased with the quality of the cover and the exact sizes the layers were cut into. Like I had read in other reviews SleepEZ made a quality product.
At last I was able to lay on my new mattress. When I ordered the mattress, I was thinking it might be too soft, but was surprised that it felt a bit firmer than I expected. It did feel quite nice, but it wasn't as soft as the mattress we had tried out at City Mattress. I was anxious to see what it felt like with sheets on it and after everything settled in place.
Our first night was great. After laying on it for a while, it did feel plusher. I was quite pleased that although it was soft enough not to cause any pressure points, it provided very nice support. My main concern had been how well my wife slept on it. Other than getting up once for a bathroom break, she slept through the whole night. Quite an unusual event.
We just slept on it for our second night and we couldn't be happier with our new mattress. The biggest problem is that we don't want to get out of bed, since it feels so good. My wife's original hope was that she would be able to sleep on her shoulders without too much pain. She hasn't been able to sleep on her back, because it would hurt too much if she stayed on it too long; and she would be way too stiff in the morning. Last night she was able to sleep on her back and she just loved it. Because there are no pressure point issues, she didn't have the normal issues she has experienced on our old mattress.
Bottom line – We couldn't be happier with our new latex mattress. I do believe that it has solved our sleep issues. I also couldn't be happier with the service I received from Shawn at SleepEZ. He was a wealth of information and very accommodating with all the questions I had on the numerous phone calls I had with him. He is very easy to work with and if anything, he undersells the product. This is quite unique, since so many mattress salesmen's goals are to move you up the line to the higher priced models. He told us that what we were looking for would be accomplished with the three layer mattress rather than the four. Had we ordered a mattress with a softer top layer, like we tried at City Mattress that felt really soft in the showroom, I have a feeling that it would have ended up being too soft for a whole nights sleep. Until you sleep on a mattress, you jut don't know. Fortunately I had learned, from reading on this forum, that most people that have issues with latex kit mattresses normally find that the mattress is too soft and they have to exchange a layer for a firmer one. I listened to Shawn and am so glad I did.
Date Purchased: Dec 2006
Price Paid: $1325
Recommend: Yes |
