Moral of the story: Brick and mortar mattress stores are becoming obsolete and charge a hefty markup. Do your research and purchase a quality mattress online. It will save you time and money and online sellers are much more flexible with returns. I have no issues with Mattress firm employees, their policies are what created the headaches.
This was my wife and my first time buying a mattress. We thought that going to a brick and mortar store to test out the mattresses ourselves would be our best bet. Unfortunately, we got tangled up with all the nonsense that is embedded in the traditional mattress buying process. We started at mattress firm and were shown the Beautyrest hybrid which we liked. The sales manager, Craig, gave us what he said was a "good deal", but we would have to pay and sign for it that day as he "may not be in the same store tomorrow" (he turned out to be in the same store for weeks to come). I found out later that day that the price he gave us for the mattress was the exact same price as their website. We had the option of canceling the order at no cost anytime before the delivery one week out. We ended up signing the papers with the intent on shopping around some more. We then went to Ashley Homestore and found a Sterns and Fosters mattress that we liked even better. I called Craig in the store and he said that he would beat their quoted price for the same mattress. We went back to Mattress Firm to find that they did not carry the same Sterns and Fosters model. I found out manufacturers sell the same mattress to different sellers just with different names to confuse buyers even more. Craig then had us try out a few comparable mattresses and we then settled on a Serta iSeries 300 hybrid (plush). We also were purchasing an adjustable frame as my wife has sleep apnea, so having the adjustable frame improves sleep quality. Craig threw in free setup of the adjustable frame and a purple pillow, so kudos to him on that. The mattress arrived a week later and they set it up no problems. After they left, I discovered that a few of the button tufts were unseamed. I called Craig to notify him of this issue and possibly get a credit on the account as I was delivered a mattress with a defect. He said that the tufting was not something that was under warranty and that he would have to contact his manager in order to see what he could do. After several calls throughout the week, there was no traction made. Sleeping on the mattress was comfy for the first couple of nights, but after the mattress broke in, we began to have some reoccurring back pain. After doing some research, having a firmer mattress is better for back support, especially with an adjustable frame. Why would we be sold a plush mattress when they were aware it was going to be on an adjustable frame and my wife had complained of back pain issues? Clearly we were not given the proper insight into this before making the purchase. After doing some more research on alternative mattresses, I stumbled upon the Avocado Green mattress. It had the highest Consumer Reports rating this past year and had very high scores for back sleepers. I also found out that the price of the Avocado was less than what we paid for the Serta. I called Craig yet again to figure out our options for returning the mattress. He informed us that we could not return the mattress until 21 days after we received the mattress. He also said there would be a 20% restocking fee for the return and that we would have to pay back the discount he gave us on the adjustable frame in order to return it. I told him this was unacceptable and that I would be willing to pay a 10% restocking fee and not pay the difference on the adjustable frame (we ended up getting this). We ordered the Avocado mattress and were very well informed of our options by their customer support team. We've been sleeping on the Avocado for a couple of weeks and could not be happier. read more