Casper Sleep S-1 (opens in new tab)

I'm guessing market dominance from years of targeted advertising on podcasts as well as buying/bullying mattress reviewer websites to make sure they stay as the highest rated.

HN from 2017: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15321807

"Casper went to war with popular mattress review site, then financed its takeover"

Advertising/marketing.

People often perceive a mattress as "very important," as sleep is important, and are willing to spend a bit extra if they think the quality will be there and they'll sleep better.

In reality I believe most of these "mattress in a box" companies are selling the same 2-3 mattress manufactured in the same factory.

Personally, I buy mattress in the $300-$500 range. When I was in college I just slept on a brick of foam because that was what I could afford.

This is preying on "wellness" concerns. Casper convinces you that a problem exists where it previously (probably) did not, that your sleep is suboptimal, and that only they can fix it for you. Prehistory, humans slept on beds of grasses or reeds on the ground. I still think 80% of your sleep quality is determined by what you do in the day: caffeine intake, amount of physical activity, overall stress level.

I have a Casper. I found it way too firm as a side sleeper, but it was too late to return it, so I bought a $100 memory foam topper from Costco to make it more squishy. I could have saved a lot of money by buying Zinus mattress from Amazon and adding the topper, but oh well.

Casper caters to stress, ripoff anxiety, social anxiety, and budget.

1. We, the millennial crowd (tm), are insanely stressed on average. Whether it's objectively genuine or falsely perceived, brought on by ourselves or otherwise, it is something we enjoy having control over -- And choosing a "simple" mattress that is straightforward to research and buy caters to that desire perfectly. For awhile Casper only had one mattress, and it seemed like an irrefutably decent mattress. You simply chose the size!

2. If you don't like the mattress you can return it within a period of time. Mattress sellers often offer this, but Casper advertises it. It adds a sense of authenticity to the sale, and I think many people (not just millenials) feel more at peace about buying the mattress without trying it first.

3. It's shipped to you and comes in a box. Usually there's no talking involved. Nobody has to come into your home. Regardless, many of us don't even have a vehicle to pick up a mattress with anyway, nor the available friends to help bring it in through the front door. Maybe a delivery person would help but what if they don't? And what if you miss the delivery?

4. Monthly payments. I feel most millennials don't really care about the total cost of something, as long as there's a monthly payment option that is reasonable. Paycheck-to-paycheck is the format we're used to budgeting in, which easily puts a monthly payment into perspective. $35/month versus $350 upfront is way more manageable.

Costco just had them for 480 bucks. I picked one up, so far it's been worth it.

Brand appeal I suppose. I remember 1/2 the Casper price tag goes to marketing - I just bought a generic Amazon Zinus for 1/2 the price that research suggested came from the same foam factory. Seems like Zinus has gone down in cost in the last few years as one would expect with economy of scale while Casper has gone up one, $250 now from Amazon shipped, 1/4 of Casper. Simultaneously feels like Casper has cut back on marketing. Also Zinus is a 40 year old Korean company that's been doing bedding for for 15 years compared to Casper, a tech company that's been around for 5. It seems like a no brainer decision for anyone doing rudimentary research.

I guess its because many people think that they need to sleep well in this hectic times and cannot allow themselves tu cut cost on a mattress. Expensive = good quality. Turns out this is nonsense - we have a foundation in germany that does independend product tests for all varieties of things and came to the conclusion that the best mattress they ever tested was some 200€ mattress.

And they're disrupting sleep by advertising on podcasts and cutting out middlemen and... now opening stores. eyeroll

Maybe they don't buy Casper? I am not cash strapped but shopped around a little bit and got a (very satisfying) queen size mattress for $600 last year @ Living Spaces.

I bought a queen at Costco this year for $599.

I just spent 1600+ on a (really nice) new queen.

I spend a lot of time on my mattress... might as well buy a nice one I really like (Stearns & Foster)

> can someone help me understand how Casper gets away with selling a $1095 mattress + tax to a majority millennial crowd, who are supposedly cash strapped, and doing so successfully?

Because the mattress sellers in the bad part of town still charge 3x more.

Thanks for pointing that one out! I had no idea. I was literally less than a week from purchasing two Casper mattresses - one for my family one for my parents. I bailed. I also told my sister to return hers since she's still in the refund window. She told me it wasn't nearly as comfortable as she thought but they gave her hard time with refund. They asked her to either pay return fees which are north of $300 or find non profit that would accept. I'm taking matters in my hand. Its sad.

Mattress reviews are notoriously fake. I would take any mattress review with a grain of salt.

Relevant HN discussion and further details about Casper’s relationship with sleepopolis.com: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15321807

Mattress/politics is really shady. Purple tried to sue this YouTube blogger that was complaining about the mysterious "secret formula" powder that Purple used prevent the plastic sticking. I ended up getting a Leesa since it was the most reputable and haven't done anything shitty.

They’re thugs.

Relevant article: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/18/there-are-now-175-online-mat...

"“Barriers to entry are low, but barriers to profitability are high,” he said. “It doesn’t take that much to design a mattress, a marketing campaign, put up a website, and have one of these big companies like Carpenter do the fulfillment for you,”"

The majority of bed-in-a-boxes outsource their manufacturing...They’re literally calling around to producers saying, ‘we need a finished product and here’s what we think it should look like.’ Sometimes, they don’t even know what they want it to look like...Most of the outsourcing is to just four major manufacturers

Can you recommend any of these cheap Amazon alternatives?

This is probably my most confusing slew of downvotes. What do you think, I own a plantation of rubber trees? I thought it was surprising and interesting that something invented ~100 years ago would be an optimal choice in a thriving market full of recent patents. Ah well.

While we love our natural latex (from flobeds.com, no affiliation!) bed, it doesn't last forever. We had to replace ours at 15 years - while it was still better off than a spring mattress, it still had become worn. It had valleys and clumps - basically the latex was somewhat broken down. Compared to the new mattress, the old was more brittle and would tear easy, while the new one was resilient and springy.

The difference between it and normal spring mattresses is amazing though. I highly recommend them!

We just bought one from Arizona (https://www.mattresses.net - no affiliation) and it's been fantastic. Sleeps really cool.

Which brand? I've never considered a latex mattress, and I need to replace my current one soon.

+1 for latex mattresses. Better than memory foam in every way.

It seems that they already saturated their Direct to Consumer channel and all their growth is now dependent on their wholesale efforts. It seems risky to me, especially with a slow-cycle business like mattresses. Also what happens if retailers create their own premium brands and/or secure exclusivity deals with other manufacturers?

Their Net Loss is still on pace to be about (90m) (most likely slightly more due to sales in Q4 being higher than others). 2018 was 93m Net loss

those are great (fantastic?) margins but i don't understand why they're not higher? there are so many memory foam mattresses on amazon that are exactly the same thing (maybe slightly shallower "soft foam" that run for e.g. ~300 for a queen that are themselves probably making great margins.

IPOs have precipitously declined since the 90s. In 1999, there were 486 IPOs. There are now approximately 190 per year. [1]

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/270290/number-of-ipos-in...

Why? In a less costly regulatory environment it would happen way more frequently and it would not be elevated as news

https://www.statista.com/statistics/270290/number-of-ipos-in...

Edit since I am rate limited: yes it is the best comparison. Let the public access more securities investments, the tools to manage risk are numerous.

I'm not totally sure what 'this' is referencing, but if its the feeling that there are too many IPOs -- I see it as a good thing!

It's so hard to find investments where a company hasn't hit their biggest growth period yet. It feels like you need to be in some inner circle of investors to get in on some of that action.

I probably wouldn't invest in Casper, but I hope the number of IPOs keeps increasing!

That's ridiculous that you were down voted. My brother slept on a rock hard bed as a kid and is able to sleep on the floor, without a pillow, all night no problem. The soft bed thing is more of a cultural issue than a biological necessity.

I've slept on a carpeted floor for decades, zero back issues.

Just one night sleeping on a conventional mattress leaves me with weird back pains and a stiff neck.

Not only are they costly and a PITA to move, mattresses waste a lot of space too.

Traditional Japanese tatami mats are basically the same thing in terms of flatness and hardness, they're not known for having sleep/back troubles.

Do you keep track of all the things you buy in case price goes down so that you can complain to customer support when they do?

In my case, I contacted support to see if I could get a discount before making the purchase and they told me to wait two weeks for an upcoming promotion. Also quickly exchanged a defect mattress.

Not saying they're the best, but complaining because they don't have retroactive sales....

I don’t see how this is a horrible service experience. There is no expectation of a company to honor future discounts. Would you return a car if its price later dropped or if they suddenly had a better deal?

Maybe they don't want a bedbug invasion in their warehouse.

I bought a cushion for my desk chair from Amazon and it turned out to be garbage so I tried to return it. They said they could only give me a refund if I sent them a picture of the cut up cushion. I didn't have to send it back, just send a picture of it with a big gash down the middle.

I guess, at least with 1800 Junk there is a good chance a employee will pluck the mattress out and put it up on Craigslist.

I wonder what would have happened if you told them you were in the middle of nowhere.

What do you suggest they do? Sell a used mattress?

Though my initial response to the title was to laugh, upon further thought I think they're actually making a smart play here.

They're essentially betting on "optimizing wellness" being a huge fad this decade, which I believe many others are predicting, and are using their current position to get more cash to get ahead of that.

I don't associate Casper with "a quality night of sleep", probably because I'm happy with my current mattress and have no need of their product, but at the same time I couldn't name a single one of the current applications that exist to track + "optimize" sleep / circadian cycles, and I'm sure I'm not alone in that, so who knows? Maybe in 2030 we'll all be moaning about Casper putting up their Nighty Night subscription another $7 for "HD dreams" and reluctantly acquiescing to it.

You are correct: https://fortune.com/2016/04/19/casper-amazon-of-sleep/

Many engineers focus on sales and marketing all the time as a normal course of jobs that involve product management. Many engineers already take into account sales and marketing perspectives in very effective ways, especially quantitative ways that are underused by employees whose sole jobs are exclusively in sales or marketing.

It’s very tiring to see engineers be tacitly assumed to need remedial time in other fields to gain sufficient appreciation for them, especially when the reciprocal deficiency of experience in engineering is virtually never raised for sales, marketing, etc. while engineers often do self-learn quite effective product and business skills.

Feels like in all of these booming startup segments there's always an Uber.

I've been using 2 of them now for well over a year and they've been excellent. I fall asleep with them every night. It's a well engineered product. The only minor criticism I could give is the dimming functionality by spinning while in the charging platform could work a little better.

> "Casper is a very inefficient wealth transfer from venture capitalists to prestige podcast makers"

___[Big Well Known Consumer Products Company]___ is a very inefficient wealth transfer from ___[Blue Chip Stock Investors]___ to prestige ___[Traditional Media Companies]___