Foam beds may be worth a lay

The first time I heard about foam mattresses, I thought they were a gimmick. I was watching a late night infomercial. A lady had a glass of red wine sitting on a bed.

The lady gets off the bed. The glass doesn’t move.

It looked cool, but I thought it was a parlor trick. I surfed over to Golf Channel or something and fell asleep.

I didn’t think about foam mattresses much after that until my mother, Robena, bought a Tempur-Pedic earlier this year after she moved to Mint Hill.

I smugly told Mom that the whole foam thing was a fad, like bell bottom pants and flat-top haircuts. I just knew my 11-year-old old Sealy Posturepedic was still the Cadillac of the go-to-sleep industry (even though it has a crevice in the center so deep you can race marbles to the bottom).

My opinion changed the first day I sunk – and I mean sunk – into Mom’s new foam bed and took a nap.

You feel like you’re supported everywhere, almost like you’re floating. You don’t bounce. You wake up in the same position you dozed off in.

This was to sleeping what the color TV was to entertainment. That experience led me to do the story in Sunday's business section that goes along with this column. I figured more folks ought to know how good these foam beds really are.

They are technically based on something called visco elastic foam, which was developed by NASA for use by astronauts.

The foam conforms to the body and redistributes the body’s weight. More of you is contact with the bed than with traditional mattresses.

It makes your back feel better. It makes your legs feel better. It makes your neck feels better.

When you get up, the elastic foam returns to its original shape. You never have to flip it.

The only drawback is cost.

Foam is about twice as expensive as most high end inner-spring mattresses.

Throughout the summer, I tried many different foam bed brands in furniture stores in Atlanta, Orlando, Charlotte and Hickory. Then I became interested in a version only available locally while researching the accompanying story.

I talked to more than 20 customers who’d bought the Tyndall-Pedic from Pineville’s Tyndall Furniture Galleries and heard story after story about how the bed changed their lives.

Then I heard more, like former Carolina Panther Frank Reich being able to return to golfing because the bed helped relieve his football-related back pain.

I met a local flight attendant, Pauline Thomas of Rock Hill, who had tried several memory foam beds and concluded the Tyndall was the best.

“And I’ve slept on tons of beds in my travels,” she said.

Curious, I visited the Pineville Tyndall location and literally laid down. For hours.

The beds were amazing. Even better than Mom’s foam model. As I switched from bed to bed, I saw two patrons walk up to hug owner Charles Tyndall and tell him how much a bed had changed their lives.

I don’t think I’ve ever thought that while sliding down the center of my Sealy.

Read the Business story by clicking here.