Christine Foster
three PR
404.835.4524
cfoster@3atlanta.com
Katie O’Neill
three PR
404.835.4527
koneill@3atlanta.com
-New BeautySleep® brand and select Beautyrest® models offer consumers entry-level opportunities to buy Simmons products, while Beautyrest Black® continues to define the luxury category with new innovations-
(ATLANTA – February 9, 2009) – Simmons Bedding Company announced today the introduction of several exciting new products and technologies focused on unleashing the power of the Simmons® step-up story and maximizing dealer profitability. A new line of open coil mattresses under the BeautySleep® name, additional Beautyrest® models and a new performance technology known as Transflexion™ are debuting at this week’s Las Vegas Furniture Market.
Simmons’ market introductions deliver enhanced value across all price points by reinforcing features that symbolize Simmons’ exceptional quality and durability – attributes that have helped make Simmons a market leader for more than 100 years.
“We are constantly engaged in market research and through that process have identified multiple consumer and product opportunities that led to the design and development of the lines we’re showing at Market,” said Simmons’ Executive Vice President of Marketing Tim Oakhill. “With these strategies, we can introduce more consumers to the Simmons franchise and give our dealers a breadth of product options to step consumers up and drive profitability at retail.”
(more)
Simmons Focuses on Maximizing Dealer Profitability/ page 2
Simmons is offering the strongest step-up opportunity in the category with its new BeautySleep® brand. An embodiment of comfort, support and durability, the line is comprised of 10 high-performance open coil models priced from $399 to $799 some of which feature visco memory foam and foam encased edge support.
“Research has shown that the BeautySleep® name itself has near automatic recognition among consumers, which exceeds that of many other established brands in the industry. We believe that the name, together with our product designs and range of comfort levels, will create retail excitement and a big opportunity for our dealers to drive traffic to their stores,” said Simmons’ Brand Director Rolf Sannes. “These efforts combined with the power of Simmons’ merchandising strategies should give our dealers the most powerful line of products to drive revenue by leveraging the consumer step-up into the full Simmons® product portfolio.”
The Simmons® Beautyrest Black® line continues its legacy of redefining the luxury category for the bedding industry, with product introductions that feature the Advanced Pocketed Coil™ in a new coil unit design. This construction, called the Variform Advanced Pocketed Coil™ spring unit, brings a new range of comfort options to the brand by varying the configuration of the coil for a greater difference in feel between models. The new line also leverages Simmons’ patent-pending Transflexion™ process technology. Mark Owen, Simmons’ vice president of brand management, believes that the new process will create products with the highest tolerances and comfort consistency that the industry has ever seen. “The combination of technologies that is in our newest Beautyrest Black® line will take our offerings to the next level by having the consistency of feel from floor sample to home delivery,” said Owen. “Higher consumer satisfaction means maximized profitability for our dealers.”
(more)
Simmons Focuses on Maximizing Dealer Profitability/ page 3
Simmons is also displaying new Beautyrest® Classic products with suggested retail prices below $1,000, along with three new Beautyrest® World Class® models that are targeted to retail between $1,000 and $2,000. All of the models offer the conformability and motion separation benefits of Beautyrest® Pocketed Coil® technology, and the new World Class® models feature Simmons’ patent-pending Evenloft™ Design. The Evenloft™ Design eliminates the use of quilt stitching to create a smooth sleeping surface and provides consumers with a differentiated feel that results from closer contact with the bed’s comfort layers and Pocketed Coil® springs.
“The introductions with Evenloft™ work with the current Beautyrest® product offerings and are the perfect way for dealers to further enhance their Beautyrest® merchandising strategy,” said Sannes.
Simmons will exhibit the company’s new products at its World Market Center showroom (building A, space 525) during this week’s Las Vegas Furniture Market. For additional information on Simmons® products, visit www.simmons.com.
Atlanta-based Simmons Bedding Company is one of the world's largest mattress manufacturers, manufacturing and marketing a broad range of products including Beautyrest®, Beautyrest Black®, Beautyrest Studio™, ComforPedic by Simmons™, Natural Care®, Beautyrest Beginnings™, BeautySleep® and Deep Sleep®. Simmons Bedding operates 19 conventional bedding manufacturing facilities and two juvenile bedding manufacturing facilities across the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. Simmons Bedding also serves as a key supplier of beds to many of the world’s leading hotel groups and resort properties. Simmons Bedding is committed to developing superior mattresses and promoting a higher quality sleep for consumers around the world. For more information, visit the Company's Web site at www.simmons.com.
###
This news release includes forward-looking statements that reflect Simmons Company and its subsidiaries’ (collectively referred to as “Simmons”) current views about future events and financial performance. Words such as “estimates,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “projects,” “plans,” “intends,” “believes,” “forecasts” and variations of such words or similar expressions that predict or indicate future events, results or trends, or that do not relate to historical matters, identify forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements in this report speak only as of the date of this report. These forward-looking statements are expressed in good faith and Simmons believes there is a reasonable basis for them. However, there can be no assurance that the events, results or trends identified in these forward-looking statements will occur or be achieved. Investors should not rely on forward-looking statements because they are subject to a variety of risks, uncertainties, and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from Simmons’s expectations. These factors include, but are not limited to: (i) competitive pressures in the bedding industry; (ii) general economic and industry conditions; (iii) the success of Simmons’s new products and the future costs to roll out such products; (iv) legal and regulatory requirements; (v) interest rate and credit market risks; (vi) compliance with covenants in, and any defaults under, Simmons’s debt agreements or instruments; (vii) Simmons’s ability to comply with the terms of the forbearance agreements or to develop and implement an organized financial restructuring on acceptable terms, on a timely basis or at all; (viii) increased cost of credit and associated fees resulting from the forbearance extension and any waiver or modification of the senior credit facility by the lenders or any waiver or modification of the notes or other indebtedness; (ix) lender calls requiring Simmons to immediately repay all amounts outstanding under the senior credit facility resulting from the noncompliance with the covenants which could in turn result in a default under Simmons’s subordinated notes and discount notes and Simmons Holdco’s term loan facility; (x) Simmons’s relationships with and viability of its suppliers; (xi) fluctuations in Simmons’s costs of raw materials and energy prices; (xii) Simmons’s relationship with and viability of significant customers and licensees; (xiii) Simmons’s ability to increase prices on our products and the effect of these price increases on its unit sales; (xiv) an increase in Simmons’s return rates and warranty claims; (xv) Simmons’s labor relations; (xvi) encroachments on Simmons’s intellectual property; (xvii) Simmons’s product liability claims; (xviii) Simmons’s level of indebtedness; (xix) foreign currency exchange rate risks; (xx) Simmons’s future acquisitions; (xxi) Simmons’s ability to achieve the expected benefits from any personnel realignments; (xxii) higher bad debt expense as a result of increased customer bankruptcies due to instability in the economy and slowing consumer spending; (xxiii) Simmons’s ability to maintain sufficient liquidity to operate its business; and (xxiv) other risks and factors identified from time to time in Simmons’s reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, either to reflect new developments or for any other reason.