My wife and I stopped in here today looking for 2 twin xl mattresses. We spoke with Pam, the sales person, who said she had been there 10 years and that she was also a manager. We spent a couple of hours in there trying out beds and we finally picked out the Beautyrest Audrina Plush Pillow Top. The pricing signs on all the beds were extremely confusing and I commented on that to Pam. My wife and I have spent most of the last month looking at beds from a number of different stores, so we were pretty well versed on the process and how pricing works. We were looking to purchase only the mattresses, without box springs, because we are going to purchase an adjustable bed frame (split king) from another manufacture (that Mattress King doesn't carry). Pam said that the pricing would be cheaper without the box springs. The pricing on the signs said that the mattress would be $450 for each piece. I had assumed that this would have meant that the price for the mattress and box spring would have been $900. So since we needed two Twin XL's she quoted us the 900$ for both mattresses (plus tax). We told her that we wanted to go to lunch and think about it, and spend a little time doing reviews on Mattress King (which there are hardly any). We decided to go ahead with the purchase and returned after lunch to finalize the deal. Pam closed the deal with us and charged our credit card the 900$ (plus tax) for 2 Twin XL mattresses. So she had plenty of time to think about it while we were gone for the 2 hours. We felt good about our purchase.
A couple of hours later, after we got back home, Pam called us and told us that she had made a mistake, and that the owner had said that she couldn't sell us just the mattresses at the 450$ price. She said that the 450$ price was only if you had purchased the box springs as well in a set. Meaning that we would have had to purchase 2 sets of twin xl box springs and mattresses for a total of 1800$ (plus tax). She said that it was her mistake, and that they would lose money on the deal. She said the owner would sell us the mattresses only for 600$ each (so 1200 total for 2 of them that we needed), which was 300$ more than what we initially agreed on. Needless to say, we were highly upset. The signs are clearly misleading. No where on the sign does it say that you HAVE to purchase both the mattress and the box springs to get that listed price. In fact the signs say $450 for "each piece". We have been shopping at many other stores, and most of the stores will have the prices clearly listed as the price with and without the box spring. I knew these signs were confusing, that is why we pointed that out to her initially, and wanted to make sure from the beginning that we were getting the mattress "only" price. We also made it very clear that this was for an adjustable bed, so we would not need the box spring.
Needless to say we were highly disappointed. I feel like this was a bait and switch tactic of some sort. Pam repeated over and over that this was her mistake, and that there was nothing she could do about it. She also tried to blame it on a car accident that left her with ADHD.. Whatever that means. A salesperson/manager as she claimed, with 10 years experience at that store, should be more than familiar with the pricing structure and how to put to the sale together. She also had 2 hours to figure out that she made a mistake before we came back to complete the purchase. Unacceptable.
Truth be told, we would have probably still purchased the mattresses at the higher price, as long as we had been told that from the beginning. But this left such a bad taste in our mouths that we decided to cancel the order based on principal. I made it pretty clear to them their signs were confusing and misleading, and that it would be in their best interest to fix them. This all seems deceptive to me, and my wife and I will not recommend this place to anyone looking to purchase a mattress. We will choose to make this purchase at another mattress store, even if it means it is for more money.
IMHO.. the mattress buying process and experience as well as the mattress industry is probably the worst thing I have ever had to go through as a consumer. The whole industry is pretty much geared to screw the consumer. I hope we find what we are looking for soon, because I would not want to wish this experience on anyone. read more