Even Mattress Firm is launching its own bed-in-a-box brand

In another sign that the $14 billion mattress industry is undergoing a sea change, Mattress Firm has just debuted a bed that customers can buy online and have shipped directly to their house—in a box—in two days. This new brand, called Tulo, launches online today, with queen-size beds going for $650, which is on the lower end of Mattress Firm’s range.

Mattress Firm, which was acquired for $2.4 billion by Amsterdam-based furniture giant Steinhoff International last year, is the biggest bedding retailer in the United States. It’s a bastion of the traditional approach to selling mattresses: Customers come into stores, where they can select from hundreds of different options. Beds are then delivered by truck.

Over the last four years, thanks to bed-in-a-box startups like Casper, Tuft & Needle, and Leesa, many consumers are choosing to skip the in-store experience altogether. Instead, they prefer to buy their mattresses the way they buy toilet paper on Amazon, with a few clicks of a mouse. Sunni Goodman, Mattress Firm’s head of communications, says the company developed Tulo in a startup-like environment to better meet the needs of younger consumers who aren’t interested in shopping in the traditional way.

Mattress Firm isn’t the only big player in the bed-in-a-box game. Serta Simmons recently launched Tomorrow, a sub-brand targeting millennials. It’s still early in the bed-in-a-box boom, but what is clear is that the biggest players in the mattress world are betting that more and more consumers will buy their mattresses online.ES