Brief History of Memory Foam

While memory foam was developed for NASA in the 1970's, it didn't hit the consumer market until the early 1990's - first as memory foam mattress toppers, and later used in memory foam mattresses. Since then, memory foam mattresses have become the fastest growing segment in the mattress industry. With every year, you see more and more companies selling memory foam mattresses and topper pads, and it is very difficult, even for those of us in the industry, to keep up with all the new memory foam products being introduced.

After memory foam was developed as part of a NASA project, some saw the promise of memory foam for use in the medical industry to relieve pressure sores. Over the years, memory foam was shown to be unique in the way it responded to temperature and also in its ability to spread pressure over a greater surface area (and thereby reducing pressure points significantly). While the initial version of the foam developed for NASA (called T-Foam) did have a great deal of promise as a bed topper or wheel chair cushion material, it did have issues with wear over time. This first generation of material wasn't very durable, and would often compress or crack over time.

The first company to realize the potential of memory foam for the consumer market was Tempur-Pedic ®. They had worked on creating their own version of memory foam, and developed foam they called Tempur ®, that was much more durable and still had the pressure reducing benefits of memory foam. Initially, this Tempur ® foam was used in medical settings, but soon they began to hear that patients who used the foam slept better, had less back pain, and felt more refreshed in the morning. A light bulb switched on over someone's head in Sweden, and Tempur-Pedic ® began to sell the products to consumers.

Due to its origin as a medical device, Tempur ® foam was very expensive, and has stayed that way to this day. After a few years on the consumer market, other foam manufacturers saw the potential of memory foam and began to produce their own memory foam product lines. Because these manufacturers came from the consumer foam industry, rather than the medical industry, their cost structure for memory foam was much lower and they priced their products at a fraction of the Tempur ® foam. As the years went by, memory foam became more and more popular, and now manufacturers all over the world are making their versions of memory foam.

What you need to remember is that not all memory foams are equal. They differ a great deal in quality - density, hardness or softness, response to temperature, and also durability and longevity.

Memory Foam Really is Unique, and Has Unique Benefits

No other bedding material compares to memory foam in the way it conforms to your body and reduces pressure points. However, you wouldn't want an entire mattress made strictly of memory foam. Memory foam is too soft a material and isn't meant to be supportive. So it works best when layered over a firm, supportive material. That is why you will mainly find memory foam as a 2" or 3" topper to be used on your existing, firm mattress, or as a 2" or 3" topping layer in a new memory foam mattress. There are a couple of reasons that memory foam is so unique. First is the way memory foam cells deform when weight is applied. Unlike standard foams that compress and want to spring back to their original shape immediately, memory foam cells (open cell foam, which means the individual cells in the foam have holes in them) compress fully and spread their air pressure to adjoining cells. This spreads the pressure through a greater number of cells of the memory foam - which decreases the pressure you feel in the cells of the memory foam that you are laying on. This accounts for the way that memory foam actually reduces pressure points. And this ability of memory foam to deform also allows it to really conform to your body's shape and weight bearing areas, thereby reducing these pressure points. No other material has this ability to shape to your body - this is unique to memory foam. Second, memory foam is temperature sensitive. Which means that at lower temperatures it is firmer (more viscous), and at higher temperatures it is softer and more conforming (more elastic). Hence the reason memory foam is known as visco-elastic memory foam. This temperature sensitive quality accounts for the melting feeling that you get lying down on memory foam, and also accentuates the custom molding affect of the foam. Certain memory foams, such as Tempur-Pedic's ® Tempur foam, are quite temperature sensitive and can get firm even near room temperature. The memory foam used in our toppers and mattresses, in contrast, have a broader range of temperatures where they stay nice and soft, so they work well in different climates.

When you buy memory foam, you will pay more for a denser foam. It simply costs more to make denser foam - more raw materials go into making a denser substance. But density alone doesn't tell you about the feel or comfort of memory foam. In point of fact, all density tells you is how much the foam weighs.

Denser memory foam, in general, tends to have more of that special memory feel that makes the foam unique.

So what type of memory foam should you look for? This issue is somewhat different depending on whether you are looking to buy a memory foam mattress or a memory foam topper to put on your existing bed. This is because the memory foam in a mattress is bonded to the "mattress core", and as such, can't be replaced, so it must not only be comfortable, but durable as well. A topper, on the other hand, is less expensive and can be replaced if it wears out after a few years. So when you are researching a memory foam mattress, you need to look for one that uses memory foam which is both comfortable and durable. With a topper pad, comfort alone is the main issue since you can easily replace the topper.

With a mattress, you should look for at least 2 inches of medium to high density memory foam. 2inches of memory foam gives you a proper amount of material to cushion and conform to your body. While you could get by with 2 inches of memory foam in a mattress, 3 inches is plusher and a more comfortable feel for most people. It's a nice depth of foam where you wouldn't sink uncomfortably into the bed or lose the support of the base foam. Some mattresses offer much thicker memory foam layers and they feel too cushy - you get sucked in, and adjusting from side to side can be a real problem. As for densities of memory foam used in a mattress, we've had a change of mind with this over the years. For a long time, we've often heard from customers that they liked the feel of the "less dense memory foams" (memory foams 60kg  density or lower) better than that of the high density memory foam of the "leading brand" (memory foam of 80kg  or greater density). That is because people feel the "less dense memory foams" had a softer, more user friendly feel while the higher density memory foams could feel stiff and could be difficult to move around in.

Please find bellow the answers to some of the most asked questions about memory foam:

“How long will a memory foam mattress last?”

This has got to be the most frequently asked question about any mattress. The answer is a quality memory foam mattress should last a good 10 years. This will

“Will this mattress sleep hot?...I've heard that foam makes you sweat".

Our answer is that the older foam mattresses did cause most people to sweat.  This was especially true in the more humid climates around the country.  They caused heat to build up at any place your body was touching.  This soon caused sweat to form and made the mattresses very undesirable to sleep on.  In addition, the sweat was absorbed into the foam, causing it to develop an offensive odour.  In certain climates, mould could even start to develop. Even the early visco elastic foam mattresses had this problem, to some extent.  Modern manufacturing processes have pretty much eliminated the sweat problem because most of the mattresses made from visco elastic foam now have "airflow systems".  These are made differently from manufacturer to manufacturer, but, their purpose is to allow air to be circulated between your body and the mattress. Another great feature of the latest generation memory foam mattresses are the Coolmax and Outlast covers. These are special fabrics that control body humidity don’t allow your body to overheat.

"Since the visco elastic foam molds to your body, will you feel like you're rolling out of a hole when you turn over at night?"

A few people have complained about this feeling, but it was mainly in the colder months of the year. Visco elastic foam, by nature, reacts to temperature.  One of the features of the foam, that makes it so comfortable, is the way it softens when your body temperature starts to warm it up. Of course, what goes up, must come down.  When visco elastic mattresses are left in a cold room (mainly below 55 degrees F) they will become firmer. Usually, it just takes a few hours with the heat back up to warm the mattress. The mattress is cold and firm initially, but your body warms it up pretty quickly. We can't say it's comfortable, when this happens, and I'm definitely in a hole.  It isn't hard for me to roll out of it, but it's there, for sure. This is a small price to pay for the overall, year-around comfort we enjoy with our visco foam mattress.

“Do visco elastic foam mattresses have a smell?  What causes it and is it toxic?"

Many times your mattress will have an odour when you first receive it. The industry term for this is "off-gassing".  It's caused by the manufacturing process and being packaged in material that doesn't breathe. Many people say the smell is similar to a new car smell and they don't object as long as it dissipates within a reasonable time.  It's all part of the experience. To others, the smell is objectionable.  Most of the time, the smell will go away in 2 to 3 days at most.  One way you can help dissipate the smell quicker is to remove the zippered cover and air the mattress, for those mattresses that have this feature.  Removing the cover will allow the material to breathe.