Home » Shopping For Beds > When to Buy a New Bed

This is obviously the first topic you should consider before beginning your shopping trip. After all, if you spend hours and hours shopping for a bed then give up in frustration, nothing gets accomplished except a waste of a lot of free time. To start with, what prompted you to look at a new bed in the first place? Was it an advertisement with a pretty girl telling you how much more comfortable you would be on her brand of bed? Maybe it was the commercial on the radio telling you to come to a store for a free lunch, then a salesman pressuring you into an expensive purchase. Perhaps is was that spokesperson on TV who says that his innovation beats everything else on the market comfort and support.



Maybe you are like millions of other people in the United States and you just have a hard time falling asleep. Maybe you wake up with a pinch in your back or a stiff shoulder. Maybe you wake up several times at night tossing and turning. Of all the reasons you should consider buying a new bed, these three should be an instant indicator. Any kind of difficulty sleeping, pain, of discomfort you feel when in your bed should be treated as an early warning sign, an alarm that more serious problems will arise if not addressed soon.



A second reason to consider a new bed would be a change in your medical condition. If you go from being a healthy comfortable sleeper to dealing with a long-term or permanent medical concern, then a new bed could help prevent some problems while you recover or convalesce. As an example, if you have recently been diagnosed with cancer, osteoporosis, arthritis, or other similar conditions, you may benefit greatly from improving the quality of your sleep, and you could even see an improvement in your medical condition by improving your sleep quality.



Regardless of why you do not sleep well, there is no substitute for good sleep. No amount of coffee or energy drinks, no pills, and no herbal remedies can replace 7-8 hours of good quality sleep every night. Another misconception is that if you sleep a couple of hours in the afternoon then 4-5 hours at night that it evens out. This is complete ignorance about the importance of sleep, and most often you will hear people say this to try and justify something else going on in their life. Recent medical tests have shown that as little as 6 hours of quality uninterrupted sleep can be more beneficial than 8+ hours of interrupted sleep. This is because your body sleeps in cycles, and only the deepest "Delta Phase" period of sleep is when your body recovers from the previous days activities. If your sleep cycle is interrupted, you will likely lose one or more of the delta phases of sleep.

So how do you pick the right bed? Start with your current bed, and improve on it. Is your bed soft or firm, is there a body impression or sag? How old is your bed? What brand and type is it? All of these questions are important. You need to know the brand and type (pillow-top, box-top, or euro-top) to help you figure out if you should get the same thing again, or in which direction to go from that bed. If you have a box-top (no additional top layer) and it feels too firm, then you may want to consider a pillow-top or euro-top. Is your pillow-top separating causing a sag spot to develop before it should? You probably do not want another pillow-top if you have experienced this in the past. If you have had your current bed for more than 5 years, then the same brand may suit you well. If you have used the same bed for 10 or more years, we might recommend that you stay within that manufacturers lines, unless there is a bigger reason to move to another manufacturer. Of course, if you are evaluating a new type or technology in a bed, then you might not be able to stay with the same manufatcturer, but you can definitely learn a lot about a bed company by doing some research, like you are doing now. Once you have made the decision to purchase a new bed, sign up for a free membership with Beds.org for unadvertised prices and specials on some of the most popular beds around.