We recently had a woman contact us about her parents old mattress that had become surplus to requirements after they moved into a retirement home.

Turns out they bought the bed the year they got married – 1951. They purchased the mattress before the Beatles & well before Rod Laver became a global tennis phenomenon.

That this couple endured 69 years on a double mattress (made of fibre wadding and coconut husks) begs the question: How often should you replace your mattress? A lifetime, 20 years, 10 years?

We recommend replacing your mattress every 8-10 years and it’s not just because we’ve got a vested interest to sell you another. There are real reasons and they centre around your health & wellbeing.

So when is it time to invest in a new mattress & more importantly why?

Spills & stains

Your mattress serves as more than just a place to sleep. It can sometimes serve as the hub of the home.

There’s the kids, sleeping animals, watching television, reading emails, sick days, eating breakfast, quenching your thirst in the middle of the night and of course, sex.

So at the very least, to protect your bed investment from the start – get a ​waterproof mattress protector​. A small outlay for significant returns.

Bed bugs & beyond

Dust mites are going to make your mattress their home over time. They love warm humid environments & they feed off dead skin so your mattress is their utopia.

An Ohio State University study found that a used mattress might have as many as 100,000 to 10 million mites inside. A typical person sheds as much as 5.7 grams of dead skin a week – so there’s plenty to feast on.

These mites can trigger allergies, not to mention live inside your mattress and it’s pretty hard to get rid of them. The bad news is they aren’t just in the mattress but will live on top of your bedding.

You can help keep them at bay – ​wash your sheets regularly in a hot wash 40℃​ or more and vacuum the surface of your mattress to hoover up dead skin cells and dust.

Weighing in

There’s a common misnomer out there in bed land that after 10 years, your mattress weighs twice as much as it was when you purchased it. We’re disputing that one – yes, a mattress possibly weighs a little more with moisture, dust, skin cells and the aforementioned creatures above but it’s unlikely to double in weight. The 69-year-old double mattress that came back to us this month weighed 40kg.

However, it contains heavy coconut fibre that is no longer used to make beds anymore and as a truly upcycled mattress – the comfort layers were made of fibre wadding formed from leftover pieces of clothing scraps gathered up and delivered to us.

An equivalent new double mattress today goes out of our factory at approximately 27kg.

Wear & Tear

So if we haven’t convinced you with what’s living in your mattress to replace your aging bed then consider the materials used to make it and how they degenerate over time.

Back to our 69 year old mattress – it doesn’t have foam inside it, foam wasn’t available back then, just the cotton wadding for comfort.

Foam, as comfortable and soft as it is – is the ingredient inside your mattress that won’t perform as well after 8-10 years of you sleeping on it.

Most of our warranties typically cover 10 years and we encourage you to ​register your bed​ with us for peace of mind.

Over a decade you’ll clock up nearly 30,000 sleep hours on your mattress. Over time, foam doesn’t bounce back to its original shape – the denser the foam the longer it will last over time.

Beds are a bit like a pair of running shoes – you can still run in them but eventually they lose their rigidity, shape and tread.

However, with a bed – rotating your mattress when it’s new and then periodically over time will help extend your bed’s life.

So if you’ve come to the conclusion that maybe it’s time to replace your mattress, first try our sleep selector​ to find out your ideal bed.

Then, check out the ​special offers from our retail partners and consider upgrading to that luxury mattress you deserve!