Beds for backs

Not much room, you would have thought, for a new, independent operator to try to muscle in against the big boys.

But that is exactly what has happened with the recently launched Sleep Solutionzzz, which is now trading healthily from a Didcot warehouse.

Yet this enterprise is more than just a hopeful punt in a competitive market. Sleep Solutionzzz is actually the showcase for an existing business that has been operating for more than 20 years.

In fact, when you buy a mattress, it is a green buying decision because it has been manufactured next door by parent firm The Foam Company.

This business specialises in manufacturing visco elastic — or memory foam — mattresses which have become hugely popular in recent years.

Back in 1986, it started life as a more traditional supplier to upholstery manufacturers and still continues in that line today.

But with the decline of traditional upholstering in the face of cheap imported furniture, The Foam Company, headed by chairman Chris Nash and supported by managing director son Michael and fellow director Jon Baker, needed a new direction.

The foam mattress revolution in the UK had been started by Swedish company Tempur in the 1990s, but The Foam Company had been developing fire retardant foams for some years, and was no stranger to innovation.

Six years ago it started up a new brand, Sleepshaper, manufacturing mattresses made from visco elastic, more commonly known as memory foam.

Mr Nash explained: “Tempur was marketing itself more as a medical aid so, as an experiment, we made a pillow and then a mattress which we then shoved in the back of a car and approached the retail market.

“The first 50 people we approached bought the mattress.”

A lot of product development then followed to produce a mattress that brought all the benefits of memory foam at a reasonable price.

Within two years, the Sleepshaper mattress range had won a Best Buy award from Which, showing how quickly work progressed.

Now the company produces more than 600 mattresses a week and distributes tham all over the UK, Ireland and even to Gibraltar.

With the decline in the traditional furniture industry, the company had originally been left with an empty unit at its base in Lower Broadway, Didcot.

That was filled by Newbury Beds but when it closed down last year, the question arose again about what to do with the place. The answer seems obvious in hindsight.

Mr Nash said: “The obvious thing to do was to have a showroom and we put everything together in under three weeks.”

Another obvious reason for starting Sleep Solutionzzz was that the company did not have an Oxfordshire stockist for its product range, which now stretches to 14 different mattresses ranging in price from £99 to £1,499.

While the Sleep Shaper range is not deliberately marketed as being beneficial for health issues such as back problems, Mr Nash has had plenty of positive feedback from customers claiming the mattresses have helped them.

And the company does supply the NHS and private hospitals with cushions and seating made from the memory foam.

Naturally, the firm has to be competitive against the big boys, despite being a small, independent player and promises delivery within two weeks, while also stocking a vacuum-packed range of mattresses that can be bought on the spot.

It has five sales agents and two full-time sales reps representing every area of the country, with the biggest customer being the New Bridge Street bedding centre in Newcastle Upon Tyne.

It seems the company has captured its own little corner of the market, proving that with a quality product, there is still business to be done no matter what the competition.

Name: The Foam Company/ Sleep Solutionzzz Established: 1986 Chairman: Chris Nash Number of staff: 25 Annual turnover: £3m

Contact: 01235 811866 Web: www.sleepshaper.co.uk