If you're shopping for a new mattress and are considering a traditional innerspring, you're not alone: More than half of Consumer Reports readers we've surveyed have stuck with this time-honored variety for years. But specialty types are advancing, reports Furniture Today magazine, while innersprings are dipping in sales. And all types continue to get more expensive.

That's among news from the International Sleep Products Association's annual Bedding Barometer, which noted price increases in the neighborhood of 4.5 percent for major bedding types. Innerspring mattresses dipped in unit sales by almost 2 percent. Specialty types, such as memory-foam and adjustable-air mattresses, leaped by more than 24 percent between 2010 and 2011.

Our own 2011 Annual Questionnaire included a section on mattresses. More than 12,500 subscribers told the Consumer Reports National Research Center about their sleep experiences with mattresses, along with 5,821 recent mattress-shopping experiences—and how satisfied they were with both mattress brands and retailers. We'll be updating our report with greater detail in the coming weeks. In the meantime, we're already seeing some notable conclusions.

Respondents who suffer from arthritis, joint problems, or chronic back pain, for instance, seemed to make their mattress choices mostly by how comfortable the mattress felt in the store, followed by price. And more so than other consumers, they chose by a brand's reputation for helping with sleep problems or neck and back pain. And more than respondents without pain, they selected one of two brands. Those were Select Comfort (which includes Sleep Number), a maker of adjustable-air mattresses, and Tempur-Pedic, a proprietary memory-foam brand.

Apparently, these were good decisions. The group of respondents with arthritis, joint problems, or chronic back pain reported improved sleep in greater numbers than other respondents.

Source:
U.S. mattress sales rose 0.2% in units, 7.7% in dollars last year (Furniture Today)