The holidays are just around the corner. This usually means a full schedule and a full house. We’re looking forward to having friends and family over, baking tasty treats and sharing fantastic meals. And we do everything we can to make sure our guests have a wonderful time while in our care, which brings us to this month’s topic: The dreaded sofa bed.
We’ve all been there. We’re either apologizing to our guests, or being apologized to, as the sofa cushions are removed and the worn-out sofa bed clunks into place. Often a mythical family member is referenced as having said how comfortably they slept here on their last visit (in 1998). Let’s be honest. We usually don’t think about the guest bed until it is too late. But not this year!
Imagine unfolding that sofa bed to reveal a handmade, certified organic Soaring Heart latex bed! “Well, good night guests…sweet dreams…and you’re welcome!” We’re thrilled to announce our first sofa bed mattress, the Willow. The Willow is a 4” latex mattress to upgrade the old, uncomfortable sleeper mattress that came with your sofa bed. It’s flexible enough to fold for storage, just like your current sleeper sofa mattress. And we’ve replaced those flimsy coils with organic rubber, so you and your guests will be comforted and supported by the best bedding material known to man. It’s science!
We’re sure you’ll find more uses for this ingenious mattress. Use it as an extra comfort layer on your mattress. Lay it out on the living floor for movie nights and kid’s sleepovers.
For the first time in history, you and your family may end up fighting over who gets the sofa bed. Who uses it is your decision; we’re just here to make the lucky winner as comfortable as possible. And for a little extra holiday cheer, we’re offering 10% off the Willow for the whole month of November. If you have any questions, give us a call or stop by the showroom. We’re happy to help!
Warm holiday wishes,
-Louis
Soaring Heart Sales Manager
For 35 years Soaring Heart has been committed to bringing you the best selection of all natural and organic beds and sleep products. Not only do we believe sleeping organic makes a difference in the quality of your comfort - we go the extra mile to make sure we can prove every one of our suppliers cares as much as we do!
OMI - OrganicPedic Duo OMI - OrganicPedic 81-Zoned Comfort
This month we're announcing a new partnership with OMI - Organicpedics. Based in northern California, we believe OMI's "Purity Guarantee" offers you a certified range of assurances that only a large scale manufacturing factory can provide. Their owner, Walt Bader, wrote the book on toxins in the bedroom and we're happy to be the only retailer in the northwest bringing you OMI certified products.
Consumer beware – every day we see claims from suppliers and retailers about their natural and organic products. Given the levels of greenwashing in the market place, and the lack of truly enforceable global standards, consumers have little choice but to do extensive homework. Our hope is companies like ours, who go the extra mile and truly want to earn and keep your trust, stand apart in your shopping experience. We believe certifications (like GOTS and GOLS) make a big difference - and competitors who can’t get certified will say all sorts of things to confuse their shoppers.
Bottom line: at Soaring Heart we care how you sleep. We know comfort is the number one concern of mattress shoppers. And we’re working hard to educate our customers on the importance and benefits of comfortable, certified organic bedding. While we may not be the biggest mattress store in town, we are committed to offering you the best selection, the best value and the best service. With 35 years of customer testimonials, we're confident you won't be disappointed curling up in one of our beds! Stop by or call us today.
Quality sleep is important for kids. But the benefits are never more apparent than during those first few weeks of the new school year.
Whether they’re walking into a classroom for the first time, making the intimidating transition from middle school to high school or preparing to graduate, back to school can be a stressful time for children. And good, quality sleep can have a huge impact; affecting overall mood, behavior, perceived self-image, school performance and mental development. In fact, the University of Houston recently conducted a study in which, after just two nights of poor sleep, children derived less pleasure from positive things, were less reactive to them and less likely to recall details about these positive experiences later. Candice Alfano, a clinical psychologist and associate psychology professor at the University of Houston says healthy sleep is critical for children's psychological well-being. “Parents, therefore, need to think about sleep as an essential component of overall health in the same way they do nutrition, dental hygiene and physical activity. If your child has problems waking up in the morning or is sleepy during the day, then their nighttime sleep is probably inadequate. This can result for several reasons, such as a bedtime that is too late, non-restful sleep during the night or an inconsistent sleep schedule."
So what can you do to encourage healthy, restful sleep for your children? And how can Soaring Heart help? It boils down to two key points. First, give them enough time for sleep. We can’t really do much to help you on that one. Second, create a healthful, restful environment for sleep. Now that’s our sweet spot.
Everything we do is designed to provide you with great sleep. Each mattress, mattress topper, comforter, pillow and pad we make is handcrafted with care from the finest organic and all natural ingredients we can find. Our experts can walk you through the options and help you choose the perfect bed and bedding combination to promote the best possible night’s sleep for your little ones. Visit our website for more information on our materials and the related health benefits. Better yet, bring your kids to the showroom. Make them part of the process, trying different mattresses, toppers and pillows for themselves. Let them help create their perfect sleep space.
We’re in Fremont and Bellevue and we’re here to help!
Michael Pollan (author of The Omnivores Dilemma) came up with 7 food related rules to follow to facilitate a healthier lifestyle. We, at Soaring Heart, believe two of those rules also apply to healthier sleep;
1st, don’t eat anything your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food. “When you pick up that box of portable yogurt tubes, or eat something with 15 ingredients you can’t pronounce, ask yourself, “What are those things doing there?”
2nd, don’t eat anything with more than five ingredients, or ingredients you can’t pronounce.
This is great advice when shopping for groceries, as well as mattresses. Most folks don’t know that every mattress on display in a mattress shop is supposed to have two labels attached. For those of you who remember the old Serta commercial with the sheep getting sent to prison for ripping the tags off of the mattress, that’s what we’re talking about! One tag details the contents of the mattress, similar to the nutritional labels on the side of the cereal box in your pantry. The second specifies that the mattress has actually been tested in accordance with the 1633 federal flame regulations. Below are a few examples of tags we’ve collected as part of our mattress recycling program that detail the “ingredients” of other beds out there.
The tag on the left comes from a very expensive, luxury, European mattress that we hauled away for a nice family that replaced it with a Linden. This specific mattress retails for what used to cover a down payment on a house in Seattle and the tag notes all of its non-organic ingredients. The tag on the right is a Soaring Heart Organic Latex mattress and details the organic materials found in all of our collections.
This brings us to our modification of Michael Pollan’s first rule.
If your grandmother wouldn’t recognize it as something you could sleep on, you probably shouldn’t sleep on it.
We took a poll of Soaring Heart grandmas to see if any of them knew what polyester and urethane were. Most knew polyester for clothing but not bedding. And none knew urethane.
Next we have a tag from a 2 year old mattress we hauled away for a family that bought an Aspen, on the left. They were put off when they realized they were sleeping on something called an “Enduralator Pad” and called us to find a healthier innerspring mattress option. While this mattress came in at a desirable price point, it’s an example of a mattress that breaks our modification of Pollan’s second rule; don’t sleep on anything made of 5 or more ingredients. Having 5 or more ingredients in a mattress can prove problematic. As the mattresses ages, different materials have different break down rates.
As the saying goes;
Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
Which is why our organic innerspring mattress, above on the right, only has three ingredients; organic cotton, organic wool and the innerspring.
These examples are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to things you can learn about a mattress by investigating its law tag. Another important detail; where the mattress was actually made. A customer came in after doing a lot of research on crib mattresses for her 3 month old. We made her son a bassinet to sleep in for the first 3 months. She decided to go with another company on the crib mattress, only to realize their claim of “made in America” wasn’t represented on the law tag, shown on the left.
Additionally, because the 100% organic cotton case isn’t listed on the tag, she couldn’t even verify its materials. According to the law tag, it’s just a shell made in China and filled in Canada with a Polyester fiber pad. After more trouble than it was worth for a new mom, she was able to get a refund and purchased a crib mattress from Soaring Heart. That tag is shown on the right.
The intention of this post is to empower folks to ask questions about the “ingredients” in their mattress the same way they ask what's in their Wheaties. If a claim seems too good to be true, check the tag and remember the rules;
If your grandmother wouldn't recognize the ingredients or it has 5 or more ingredients, don't sleep on it!
Feel free to stop by our Fremont or Bellevue showrooms anytime for more tips on navigating your way to healthy, natural sleep. We've been educating folks on the ins and outs of mattress buying since 1982. And here’s the best part. You get to try out the merchandise. Take a test rest! We encourage it!
If you missed it on MSN’s homepage recently, number one on the list of 10 ways to lose 10 pounds in 10 days is….SLEEP! The very next day, number 22 on the list of 27 best anti-aging tips of all time…SLEEP! We don’t necessarily agree that anyone should try to lose 10 pounds in 10 days. But we absolutely agree that sleep is an underrated tool in your health and wellness arsenal.
When you don’t get enough sleep, your body regulates appetite differently and you tend to crave more food. The fatigue brought on by sleep deprivation makes it easy to blow off your scheduled work out and lean on unhealthy energy-boosting foods, high in fat and carbs. Believe it or not, your body will actually store more body fat when you’re tired, as it tries to conserve energy.
As for anti-aging benefits, it’s pretty simple. When you sleep, your body goes into recovery and regeneration mode. This includes your skin. One reason so many skin care products are designed to be used overnight.
All of this is just another reminder. Don’t underestimate the power of a good night’s sleep. Your bed and bedding really can positively impact your health. We’d love to show you how. You can find more information on our website. In person is even better. Stop by our Fremont or Bellevue showrooms to browse, chat and even take a quick nap. We look forward to seeing you.
As they say - buyer beware. This past week I had the chance to visit our local mattress recycling plant and see where crews disassemble and process 100's of used mattresses each week. You'd think by now nothing would surprise me about mainstream, non-organic mattress manufacturing. But check out the photo below : yes, you got it! This high-end, individually pocketed coil mattress is encased in styrofoam!
Now there's nothing illegal about this. But really, would you buy a mattress if you read the label and understood that this is what you were going to be sleeping on?
The good folks at Springback Recycling have put together a very nice display of all the components they find in mattresses. Last year they recycled about 1 million pounds of steel (from springs), 750,000 lbs of mattress foams (typically recycled into carpet pad and insulation) and 55,000 lbs of yes, you got it - plastics.
At Soaring Heart we're committed to complete transparency about what's in our products and the costs to us as a community for the entire product lifecycle. We never use plastics of any sort, and we pride ourselves on "going the extra mile" to provide you the best all organic sleep products that we can find. It may sound simple - but thank you for helping us get the word out - it pays to read the label.
We’ve all had it. That rare occasion when you don’t have to rush to work, the kids make their own breakfast, no one has an early soccer match, someone else feeds the dog, the planets align and somehow you manage to get an extra hour of sleep. You open your eyes, a little confused at first but well-rested and refreshed…for about 4 minutes. Then comes the guilt. You “slept in.” It’s practically a dirty word for most of us. What about work, the children, the errands? You’ve let everyone down by selfishly lazing around in bed all morning. Or at least that’s what you’re telling yourself as you rush out of the bedroom to see what havoc your indulgence has created.
Take a minute and think about this. Feeling guilty for doing something your body is telling you it needs. We eat until we’re full. We drink when thirsty. Why the stigma around sleeping when our bodies tell us to? The goal with the first installment in our series of posts on sleep wellness is to talk you out of this thinking. Sleep is not a luxury item from a catalog. It’s not a splurge. You are not overindulging.
"We really need to look at sleep as something that's just as important to good health as diet and exercise," according to Ronald Kramer, MD, a spokesperson for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and a specialist at the Colorado Sleep Disorders Center in Englewood, Colorado. And he should know.
“I don’t need that much sleep.”
That may not be true. Everyone’s different. There’s no magic number. But a recent Gallup poll suggests that at least 40% of Americans are getting less sleep than they need. The general recommendation for an adult is 7-9 hours a night.
“I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”
Well, OK…but we’re not in a rush to get there. Are you? We all know the obvious side effects of a bad night’s sleep. Irritability, constant yawning, inability to focus. What about the deeper impact of sleep deprivation? According to Thomas Roth, PhD, director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, "we have good data linking insufficient sleep with all sorts of problems. It's connected to poor performance at work, obesity, diabetes, excessive risk-taking behavior, and heart disease." In fact, drowsy driving is responsible for at least 100,000 car crashes every year.
“You can’t make up for lost sleep.”
There’s a lot of debate about this. Well we’re optimists here at Soaring Heart. And there is research that strongly suggests you can catch up on sleep in the short term and reverse some of the ill effects of insufficient rest. We’re talking about daytime exhaustion, levels of inflammation in the body and Cortisol levels (which effect energy and stress management). Not to mention you’ll probably be in a better mood overall when you get a little extra shut eye. “Short term” is the key here. This doesn’t mean sleep 3 hours a night all week and then spend all day Saturday playing catch up. Some of that damage just can’t be undone. So playing the sleep catch up game should be your last resort.
“I couldn’t sleep if I wanted to.”
That just makes us sad. Everyone deserves to sleep well. If you have specific issues like allergies, heartburn or back pain that effect your ability to sleep well, stop in and talk with one of our sleep experts. They can explain how simple changes in mattress type, elevation and materials can help alleviate many common health issues. Maybe it’s a matter of environment or lack of comfort. Again, come talk to us. This is our world and we know our stuff.
We could go on and on about the importance of sleep; not just because we sell things for you to sleep on and under, but because we truly believe it. Adequate sleep is just as important as food and water. Sleep better, feel better. It’s that simple. Stop feeling guilty! Create a comfortable, natural, restorative environment and settle in for the night. And remember we’re here to help when you’re ready!
There’s a lot going on at Soaring Heart Natural Beds. We’re winning awards, improving a showroom and helping shape the landscape of green business. And we want to share the news with you.
First, a humble brag; Soaring Heart has been invited to be a featured speaker at the GoGreen Seattle conference in March. We are honored to sit alongside organizations who, like Soaring Heart, have made conscientious, sustainable, environmentally-friendly business practices the cornerstone of their work.
GoGreen empowers businesses with strategies, tools and connections to green their organizations with profitability in mind. Soaring Heart President/CEO Mike Schaefer, will be participating in the “Urban Manufacturers Fueling the Innovation Economy” panel on March 30th. If there are any business owners or decision makers in our Soaring Heart family that are interested in learning more about green business practices, we encourage you to attend the event. And be sure to stop by and say hi to Mike.
Be on the lookout for a new monthly feature on sleep wellness! Our products give you physical tools. We also want to help you develop the mental, emotional and environmental tools to reap the full benefits of proper, healthful sleep. We’ll share research, recommendations and simple tips you can incorporate into your daily routine. We hope you’ll share your own thoughts and experiences on our blog and Facebook pages, as well as sharing our tips with friends and family. Imagine the positive impact we could have on our community if we all simply slept better.
We are in the midst of redesigning our Fremont showroom and hope to have the space finished soon. If you need a little incentive to stop by and take a look, we are also bringing in new furniture lines, beautifully crafted from sustainably harvested hardwoods. And we are offering some great savings for February. 10% off adjustable foundations & organic Shikibutons!
Lastly, we are extremely proud to have won the City Beat News Spectrum Award for excellence in customer care. We know that we’re nothing without our loyal customers. We sincerely thank you for the positive comments, posts and reviews that helped Soaring Heart win this acknowledgement.
Photo: Seattle Seahawk Steven Hauschka with Soaring Heart Natural Beds Owner, Mike Schaefer
We’ve all seen Steven Hauschka warming up on the sidelines, planking, even doing the worm as a core exercise! But what you’ve haven’t seen is Hauschka’s ultimate pre-game preparation: a great night of sleep on a Soaring Heart Natural Bed!
That’s right, Steven Hauschka sleeps on a Soaring Heart organic mattress. He’s such a fan, he visited the Bellevue showroom on Saturday, greeting other customers and even enjoying some pre-game R&R and a guitar serenade.
We can’t take all the credit, but we do like to think we contributed to his perfect game against the Cleveland Browns the following day. Hauschka was 3/3 on field goals and 3/3 on extra points, scoring 12 points in the 30-13 Seahawks victory. That's what a healthy, restorative sleep can do.
Go Hawks! Go Hauschka! Go Soaring Heart!
Visit us at our
Edmonds Showroom
425-292-2808
111 Main Street Plaza, Suite 101 Edmonds, WA 98020
-or-
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206-282-1717
5447 Ballard Ave NW Seattle, WA 98107
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