As this year’s National Bed Month approaches in March, the National Bed Federation (NBF) is once again raising awareness of the importance of sleep to wellbeing and is urging people to make sure they have a comfortable, good quality bed to help them achieve a refreshing night’s sleep.
On average Brits spend 10 years at work1 and three years on holiday2 during their 80-year average lifespan, and yet many consumers don’t realise just how much difference a mattress and bed can make to their quality of their sleep.
“The amount of time and research people devote to buying cars, TVs or choosing holidays far outweighs the time invested in making sure they get a decent bed, best suited for their own sleep habits and preferences. With the technology of beds having come a long way in recent decades, even a small improvement in sleep time and quality can transform their feeling of wellbeing,” explains Simon Williams of the National Bed Federation.
With people spending around a third of their lives asleep, mattresses are subject to a staggering 20,000 hours of wear and tear over their average seven-year lifespan.
Research shows that having a good, supportive mattress is one of the key factors to sleeping well and, in fact, an uncomfortable bed could rob you of up to an hour’s sleep per night. Over the last 30 years, National Bed Month has helped to promote the health benefits of having a quality bed, particularly one made by NBF approved members.
This year’s campaign theme of ‘Wake Up on the Right Side, with the Right Bed’ gives bed-buying advice to ensure consumers get the appropriate bed for their needs. It also shares tips on how to prolong the lifespan of a bed by caring for it correctly as well as telling people how to dispose of it responsibly when it does come to the end of its life. The NBF has also partnered with The Sleep Charity to provide expert guidance to help the nation sleep better.
“With growing concern in recent years about promoting both physical and mental wellbeing, the importance of sleep in making us healthier and happier, and even helping us to live longer, cannot be underestimated,” adds Simon Williams.
“Our most recent consumer research shows that people are also becoming more aware of the role that a good mattress plays in this – last year, almost 40% of those surveyed3 said they were replacing their mattress either to improve comfort or for a better quality product. This year’s National Bed Month aims to promote the message that a quality mattress from an NBF approved member plays an important part in helping people get the perfect night’s sleep.”
Jessica Alexander, executive director of the NBF, adds: “While we’re fortunate to have a solid base of top class British and Irish bed and mattress manufacturers, as in many sectors, there has been a growth in rogue traders bringing products to market that do not meet the UK and Ireland’s robust safety regulations and trade descriptions. It just isn’t possible to look inside a mattress to verify that it contains what is claimed on the outside! so, it’s more important than ever that when people invest in a mattress, they look for the NBF-approved tick logo to give them peace of mind that the product they’re buying is made by a company that has been independently audited and is safe, clean and honest.”
Go to the NBF’s Bed Advice UK website https://bedadvice.co.uk/ for lots more information, including a bed buyers’ guide as well as advice about avoiding ‘white van man’ mattress scams and internet rogue traders.
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1 https://www.accountancyage.com/2018/10/02/how-long-does-the-average-uk-employee-spend-at-work/
3 NBF consumer research report October 2022 – research was conducted by Censuswide with a sample of 1,000 respondents who have purchased a mattress in the last six months via natural fallout from a nationally representative UK population sample
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