When it\u2019s time to buy a new mattress, my wife and I go to physical retail stores and try to make sure we\u2019re going to feel comfortable with whatever we decide to purchase.
\nThat\u2019s not a foolproof plan, as our current bed took a few years of use before it actually felt like the bed we tried in the store.
\nIt does, however, seem like testing a mattress before buying it at least gives you the best possible chance of actually liking your purchase. We have purchased mattresses online, but only for guest beds and vacation properties, which would mostly be slept on by other people.
\nSleep Savvy, a trade magazine for the bedding industry, has conducted research that shows we\u2019re not alone in wanting to try a bed before buying it.
\n\u201cWhen consumers show a preference for brick-and-mortar retailers, it seems linked to their desire to rest-test a sleep set before buying it. An overwhelming 92% of consumers say it is very (66%) or somewhat (26%) important to try out a mattress before making a purchase,\u201d the data showed.
\nAnd at a time when many formerly digital-only direct-to-consumer mattress brands have opened brick-and-mortar locations or partnered with traditional retailers, one regional chain has decided to do the opposite.
\nDream City Mattress has decided to close its physical stores and become a digital-only retailer.
\nConsumers send mixed messages
\nWhile the data above shows that most Americans prefer buying mattresses in physical stores, many actually opt to buy online.
\nThe Provoke Fall 2024\/Winter 2025 survey, conducted in conjunction with Furniture Today, showed that about two-thirds of those polled made furniture purchases online.
\n\u201cThe leading reasons given for buying online were better prices (27%), free delivery (25%), wider selection of products (19%), and a faster shopping experience (16%). A lack of nearby in-person locations was cited by 7% of respondents, with 8% noting their preferred source only sells online,\u201d the survey of 1,501 adults ages 21 to 65 showed.
\n\u201cLooking at the broader picture of which furniture items consumers have bought in the past year, mattresses were the clear frontrunner at 41%, followed by lamps\/lighting (34%) and bedroom sets (21%),\u201d according to the survey.
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In addition, while people do like to physically test mattresses and other furniture, buying online gives them access to more opinions than just whoever they might be shopping with in-store.
\n\u201cMost Furniture & Home Decor shoppers say they use reviews to evaluate long-term quality and durability when shopping for these products online,\u201d according to a 2026 survey by the Baymard Institute.
\n\u201cThat behavior makes sense in an industry where purchases are often relatively expensive, expected to last for years, and difficult to return once delivered and assembled.\u201d
\nDream City Mattress closes its stores
\nDream City Mattress, which served central and upstate New York, shared its decision to close its physical stores on its Facebook page.
\n\u201cEVERYTHING MUST GO!!!!! Liquidation Sale! After 25 incredible years in the community, we are closing both of our physical locations on August 31st. Before we transition entirely to our online store, we are clearing out every single item in our inventory. For the next 30 days, we are giving you exclusive access to our cost to empty our inventory,\u201d the company shared.
\nTheStreet was unable to access the company\u2019s website on multiple occasions between Aug. 3 and Aug. 6.
\nDream City\u2019s brick-and-mortar shutdown happens as the entire U.S. mattress industry has contracted.
\n\u201cTotal U.S. mattress market value declined 6.5% year over year, while unit shipments fell 13.2%, underscoring continued softness in consumer demand,\u201d according to The International Sleep Products Association (ISPA) 2026 Mattress Industry Trends Report (MITR).
\nIt\u2019s a broad decline across the entire country.
\n\u201cDomestic shipments declined across every U.S. region, while imports also softened, suggesting broad-based demand weakness rather than sourcing shifts,\u201d the report showed.
\nNot being able to test a mattress before buying is one of the challenges of purchasing from a purely online retailer.
\nShutterstock<\/p>\n
Digital retailers move to brick-and-mortar
\nOperating a store without having to pay for a physical location seems like a great idea, but there\u2019s a reason many direct-to-consumer, formerly pure-digital retailers \u2014 such as Warby Parker, Cotopaxi, Brilliant Earth, UNTUCKit, and, to bring it back to the mattress space, Purple, Casper, Nectar, Saatva, Helix Sleep, and Avocado Green Mattress \u2014 all moved from online-only to operating stores.
\n\u201cNow, with so much turnover in the space, some early online mattress players are opening more of their own stores to appeal to shoppers who want to touch and feel products in person. Several told Modern Retail their businesses have improved as a result,\u201d Modern Retail reported.
\nChad Lundeen, who joined Saatva in 2021 to oversee its physical retail plans, told Modern Retail that Viewer Rooms, the company\u2019s name for its brick-and-mortar stores, \u201chave contributed an 18% increase in the DMA [designated marketing area] within a very short period of time.
\n\u201cIf you put a new store in here and match it against a location of similar demographics with no store, we see a very quick spike in overall DMA, where the non-VR location stays pretty flat,\u201d said Lundeen. \u201cThis is really driving our revenue growth.\u201d
\nOnline-only mattress retail comes with challenges
\nDream City Mattress moving to an online-only model reduces some expenses, but it also comes with significant challenges.
\n\u201cOnline sounds easier to the retailer until the bills come in. Selling mattresses digital-only is a financial meat grinder,\u201d RTM Nexus CEO Dominick Miserandino told TheStreet.
\nThe biggest challenge is the physical size of the product.
\n\u201cFirst, returns eat you alive. When a customer hates the bed, they aren\u2019t stuffing a 100-pound expanded mattress back into a box. You have to pay a team to go into their home, haul it away, and write it off. At a 15% to 20% return rate, your margins vanish,\u201d he added.
\nCosts, he noted, aren\u2019t really as low as they seem.
\n\u201cSecond, you\u2019re just trading store rent for ad spend. A physical storefront is a 24\/7 billboard. Take that away, and you\u2019re forced to bid on Google and Instagram ads against national giants like Wayfair and Nectar. Acquiring that single customer gets insanely expensive, fast,\u201d he added.
\nMiserandino does not believe you can effectively run a digital-only mattress brand, and he based that on what he has seen in the market.
\n\u201cLook at the pioneer DTC brands: Casper, Purple, Nectar. They all started pure-play digital, and where are they now? They\u2019re opening physical showrooms and selling in wholesale stores. Why? Because pure digital mattress sales don\u2019t scale profitably,\u201d he told TheStreet.
\nA study by Cushman Wakefield lays out the challenge for digital-only retailers broadly.
\n\u201cAs more competitors have entered the market, digitally native brands have been vying for customers through the same digital marketing channels, which has compounded the challenge. Not only are these retailers trying to differentiate themselves in an often too-crowded field, the crowd itself has driven up digital marketing costs,\u201d according to the research firm\u2019s \u201cWhy More Digitally Native Brands Are Coming to a Corner or Lifestyle Center Near You.\u201d
\nDream City Mattress, if it actually does open an online-only store, is betting consumers will sacrifice that in-person experience in exchange for lower prices and convenience. That\u2019s a bet that many of its better-known rivals have shown is a challenging one to win.
\nRelated: Costco delivers a service Lowe\u2019s and Home Depot can\u2019t match<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"