I feel like more mattresses are bought than you would think. Think about hotels, rentals, vans, RVs, new houses, replacements and other reasons you would need a new bed (accidents)

Yes but that doesn’t explain why one you see a mattress firm there are 1-2 more across/right down the street. I think this is the conspiracy OP is referencing.

My phones on 2% otherwise I'd look up mattress stores near me and see the distance between them. Maybe there are different companies close to eachother? I just think its a supply and demand typa thing. But hey keep digging and find something out for us

I’m speaking purely from experience but there seems to rarely ever be a line mattress firm. Just seems odd.

If you haven't yet go to Tampa on Google Maps and search Mattress Firm. I'm sure there are other cities but Tampa has some of the best examples I've seen

Same reason you see different car dealerships within spitting distance. All supply and demand. To be more specific it allows each store to compete with each other so they can cover the same amount of people and the same amount of territory. That way when you go look to buy a mattress you are really only concerned about the quality/your needs at that point and not picking one just because it’s closer to you.

To be fair, alot of small time deslerships in my town have been busted with drugs, or some other illegal activity of some sort and had to shut and and ended up becoming another dealership

Still supply and demand- a new competitor will always attempt to fill the gap left by another failed business

Yeah, how many mattresses can they actually fit in a store?

I think we're approaching thing incorrectly. Instead of questioning how successful they are we should look at how unsuccessful they are. How many mattress firm stores go under?

Here is an interesting link referencing earlier reddit posts suggesting mattress firm may be laundering money mattress firm conspiracy

Perfect place to hide money. In mattresses

Freakonomics did an episode this a couple years ago. Apparently is has more to do with the ridiculous margins on the mattress that they can saturate the market with store and still thrive. The other aspect is the loans on the beds, their traps.

http://freakonomics.com/podcast/mattress-store-bubble/

I've read that the mark up is criminal,like 1000%. That alone is a conspiracy.

Are they not allowed to charge whatever they want?

Sure they can. People don't have to buy them. The issue is if all mattress companies collude to set the prices together. Then a 1000% mark-up seems suspect because if I was a competitor I would only mark it up 700% and put everyone out of business. But that's not happening.

There's no reasonably priced mattresses anywhere?

I'm not in the market for a new mattress so unfortunately I can't help you with pricing info. Reasonably priced is a relative term, as I'm sure you are aware.

I,m in the business. 50 to 150 percent markup is normal do not buy fancy labels from fancy stores

The conspiracy is that it’s a front for money laundering. Not that interesting on the scale of things.

Mattress Firm is also filing for bankruptcy now so who cares.

I don't really think it's a conspiracy. Mattress stores are only common because they can make huge profit margins and each store could be completely run with only 2 employees present. Low overhead costs, low maintenance, high profit margins, and selling a product that almost all people use are an ideal combination for a small business.

I'm happy this is a thing now. Been saying for years that there's something going on there after framing 3 of them in a block radius. Where do people who don't trust the banks hide their money? Their mattress.