Excerpt from LUXURY HOTELIERS, 2nd Quarter 2015

By Steve Tipton

We are a sleep deprived country. Studies prove it. Experts continue to stress the importance of getting the required amount of sleep in order to avoid serious health issues down the road. But nowhere is the need for a good night’s sleep more important than when you’re a business traveler. Your work performance suffers when sleep suffers. Period. To sleep better, most experts recommend keeping surroundings quiet, dark and cool. In fact, lowering the temperature of the room is often considered a quick and easy solution. However, getting out of bed in the middle of the night or first thing in the morning to a freezing cold room is far from an enjoyable way to start the day. But what if you could manage temperature a different way? What if a cool, more comfortable night’s sleep started with the bed itself? Now it can.

Temperature Management Design Technology

The latest innovation in mattress technology is all about temperature management design – from the inside out. Simmons® Beautyrest® line features an exclusive temperature management design. Tencel® now provides the first layer of temperature control, absorbing and wicking away moisture. Below that, our patent-pending AirCool® foams allow for the circulation of air, mitigating heat from accumulating in the mattress. All of this technology is designed to help the bed stay cooler and ensure guests sleep more comfortably.

Hotels everywhere continue to make the guest sleep experience a priority. Which makes sense, when you really think about it. What you expect when you stay at a hotel is the promise of a good night’s sleep. Key hotel brands have invested significantly toward this goal, understanding the power of this key differentiator and its impact on guest loyalty.

Guest Comfort Matters

Case in point? Last year, an analysis of traveler’s online reviews by TrustYou was published in an online exclusive report by Travel + Leisure. TrustYou, an online reputation management company, evaluated the mentions of beds at U.S. hotels that got at least 400 reviews with at least 10 bed mentions between January 2013 and January 2014. Simmons took 3 of the top 5 positions, including the coveted number one spot for contributing to the New York Distrikt Hotel’s guest sleep experience.

Distrikt Hotel General Manager, Jennifer Rota, was thrilled with the honor, but not surprised.

“We’ve been getting positive guest reviews and feedback about our Simmons Beautyrest® beds since the first week we opened in February of 2010,” she said.
“Delivering a truly exceptional sleep experience starts and ends with a great mattress. Everything else is icing.”

Rota said the hotel’s mission is really quite simple. “We give guests a great place to stay, sleep and come back to,” she said. “We continue to tweak details – scent, sheets, pillows, etc. — in an effort to align with guest preferences and to exceed their expectations.”

Innovators Never Sleep

Every day we think about the future; about how we can improve and move our products to the next level. Be the very best at what we do. We believe Simmons’ approach to innovation sets us apart. A talented team at our Sleep Technology and Advanced Research (STAR) center is dedicated to looking for and developing new innovative products, fabrics, foams and bedding technologies every day. We look at our product development process through the lens of total cost of ownership; how do we provide a hotel brand with a great bed at a great value that delivers an exceptional guest sleep experience for a long time? In 1925, we created the Simmons Beautyrest® and it was certainly revolutionary. Since then we’ve continued to innovate the Beautyrest Pocketed Coil® product to deliver not only an exceptional guest sleep experience, but also the amazing durability that makes our products truly special. The design is the reason why the bed is comfortable, performs and lasts a long time.

Without innovation, we’re just another bedding company. And that’s not what Simmons aspires to be.

 

Steve Tipton, Vice President, of the Hospitality Group for Simmons Bedding has lead innovative efforts to make Simmons’ hospitality bedding more sustainable and renewable. These developments include the introduction of the EverNU™ removable top for the Beautyrest® Pocketed Coil Spring® mattress, which allows the hotel industry to easily replace top upholstery layers, maintaining a fresh product without having to discard complete mattresses. In addition to reducing landfill waste, EverNU™ also drives operational efficiency to the hotel. Under Mr. Tipton’s direction, the Simmons Hospitality Group also pioneered the use of a new sustainable foundation made entirely of product from the Sustainable Forest Initiative, giving hotel owners the opportunity to sustain longer-lasting product with increased durability on a cost neutral basis.