Leggett & Platt focuses on innovation to aid both mattress manufacturers and sleepers.
Since 1883, when inventor J.P. Leggett first developed the idea of a spiral steel coil bedspring and teamed up with blacksmith and future brother-in-law C.B. Platt to bring the concept to life, Leggett & Platt Inc. has been on a mission to improve the comfort and quality of sleep.
For more than 140 years, the Carthage, Missouri-based company has been making industry-changing products, starting with innersprings and steadily expanding into related categories, such as mattress production machinery, adjustable foundations and specialty foams. During that time, it has secured more than 1,000 patents and registered more than 1,000 trademarks, with half of the trademarks relating to products manufactured by its bedding products segment.
Today, this mindset of innovation and evolution continues as the company looks for new ways to enhance the performance of sleeping surfaces, the efficiency and profitability of its customers, and the sustainability of its facilities and the materials used in its products.
Rest in Pieces: Simplifying Mattress Disassembly for Recycling
A good recent example of innovation is the Rest in Pieces hybrid bed concept that L&P debuted at the 2024 ISPA EXPO. Recognizing the difficulties involved in recycling hybrid mattresses containing pocketed coils and foam, the Rest in Pieces project set out to make disassembly of such mattresses more manageable.
“Our solution is different from others in that we didn’t want to focus on just one mattress component,” says Jason Jewett, vice president of bedding product development. “We wanted to address the whole mattress — both at the beginning of its life, when it’s being made and at the end of its life, when all of its components are recycled or discarded.”
A typical hybrid mattress features a pocketed spring unit made of polypropylene fabric and steel coils topped with multiple layers of foam. The layers of foam are glued to each other and then glued again to a scrim layer on the top of the spring unit. In addition, a layer of base foam is typically glued to the bottom of the spring unit.
“This type of construction can be tough to dismantle cleanly and quickly at most recycling facilities because of the difficulty involved in separating the various glued layers,” Jewett says.
With Rest in Pieces, L&P uses its own glueless lamination system to stitch together the top foam layers. This approach reduces the need for adhesives, making layers much easier to pull apart at the end of the mattress’ life and simpler to separate for recycling, which is particularly important if those layers contain a mix of latex, viscoelastic or polyurethane foams that are headed to different recycling streams.
at one of the company’s four U.S. innerspring plants.
The Rest in Pieces concept also takes a fresh approach to how the comfort layer is attached to the pocketed coil unit. To accomplish this, L&P places a thin polypropylene scrim layer between the surfaces and bonds the two with a strong polypropylene adhesive.
“Then, at the end of life, you’re able to easily separate the top foam layers, and the polypropylene fabric layer remains with the pocketed coil unit,” Jewett says, adding that the concept also can simplify mattress production and cut costs.
To make it easy to separate the fabric encasement and the scrim from the steel coils, Rest in Pieces adds a perforation in the encasement. “That perforation works almost like a shipping envelope, where you’re able to grab the string and peel it open,” Jewett says.
Once the fabric encasement and scrim are removed, the steel coils — which are inherently “circular” — can be recycled into new steel coils. Currently, L&P’s mattress innersprings contain more than 90% recycled scrap steel.
L&P’s Perspective: Guiding the Mattress Industry Through Innovation
While time will tell whether Rest in Pieces moves from the idea stage to actual production, Jewett says the concept has sparked valuable conversations with customers about sustainability and new ways to streamline both production and recycling.
“Our European partners who have seen this product are very interested in what we’ve done because sustainability is a big deal to them,” he says. “They see the potential, as do the recyclers we’ve talked to.”
Interest varies a lot based on geography. “The manufacturers in regions where sustainability gets more attention understand the concept right away, while those in another region may not quite get it yet,” Jewett says.
The mattress industry can be slow to adopt new technology for a variety of reasons, including the lead times involved in placing new products on retail floors, Jewett says. “It takes a while for any new idea to take hold, but the initial impression we have is that manufacturers like what they see with this concept, including the potential cost savings,” he adds.
Eco-Base Spring System: Rethinking Mattress Support and Cost Savings
Rest in Pieces incorporates one L&P innovation that has already found its way to market — the Eco-Base spring system. Introduced in 2022, Eco-Base is an integrated, engineered fiber substrate attached to the bottom of the company’s Comfort Core innersprings, providing an economical alternative to commodity base foam in hybrid mattresses.
According to the company, Eco-Base is as much as 80% lighter and 25 times thinner than a typical 1-inch polyurethane base foam while still providing the desired stability and structure for the pocketed coil unit that rests above it. Eco-Base is applied automatically during L&P’s coil manufacturing process, eliminating the need for producers to install a base foam layer later.
“Adding commodity base foam to the bottom of a mattress requires flipping, gluing and other unnecessary manual steps,” Jewett says. “It’s inefficient since it requires extra labor and foam with no value other than the basic structure it provides to keep the rest of the mattress from slipping.”
Although still a relatively new product, Eco-Base is off to a good start in terms of sales, says John Zanatta, who was named vice president of sales for L&P’s steel components business in July 2024, after serving nine years in sales with Leggett & Platt Adjustable Beds.
“The more people who try out Eco-Base, the more adoption we have,” Zanatta says. “When customers give it a chance, they see the value that it can bring in by lowering material and labor costs on the plant floor and in the warehouse. With Eco-Base, manufacturers have one less material that they need to unload and stock and one less step they need to manage in production.”
In addition, Zanatta says, switching to Eco-Base has the potential to improve mattress performance because the money manufacturers might otherwise spend on base foam can be diverted into enhancing comfort layers.
“A sleeper gets no benefit from a commodity base foam since all it does is keep the encased coil unit in place,” he says. “A manufacturer can take the cost savings they get from Eco-Base and use that to improve the comfort layers — or they can use the savings to make the price of the mattress more competitive.”
Eco-Base is currently offered on L&P’s Quantum Edge and Caliber Edge coil systems —two ActivEdge products that replace the foam outer edge of the mattress with coils that run to the edge of the sleep surface. Replacing that edge foam with coils and a steel perimeter results in a “better-performing sleep surface from edge to edge of the mattress,” Zanatta says.
In addition, the company says, mattresses constructed with an ActivEdge steel-and-coil perimeter instead of foam encasement help reduce reliance on petroleum-based chemicals.
Quantum Edge coils offer a variety of zoning options for tailored comfort and are packable and shippable.
Foam Encasement Reimagined: Cost and Time Savings for Manufacturers
Still, because some producers — and consumers — prefer the feel of foam on a mattress edge, L&P added a new foam- encased feature to its line in late 2024 aimed at serving foam-edge enthusiasts while introducing new efficiencies to the manufacturing process.
“There’s a portion of the market that likes foam rails,” Jewett says. “So, we decided to take a fresh look at that segment as well to see what we could do better.”
In developing the new foam-encased designs, L&P took a cue from its ActivEdge coils. “One of the reasons that ActivEdge coils are so successful is that they take the foam encasement step out of the mattress manufacturing process, which tends to be one of the bigger bottlenecks in a mattress factory,” Jewett says.
L&P’s new foam-encased units take a similar approach by making the foam edge part of the innerspring unit. “Now, when these pre-foam-encased units arrive at a plant, the foam edge on all four sides is already integrated so that the units are ready to go directly into mattress production,” Jewett says.
Like Eco-Base, which can be paired with the new foam-encased innerspring systems, this solution reduces product and material handling, as well as manufacturing costs. “In today’s highly competitive environment, everyone is looking for ways to be more efficient and this gives customers another option to streamline production,” Jewett says.
As one of the bedding industry’s leading suppliers, L&P offers a full range of options across its line, both in terms of price and features. And, in recent years, applications for its spring products have expanded beyond the mattress core to include mattress perimeters and the comfort layer. Its line includes fabric-encased ComfortCore innerspring systems, open coil spring systems, steel wire foundations and NanoCoil comfort layers.
“We pride ourselves on having a very diverse offering,” Zanatta says. “Having a wide range of products in our line allows us to work with many partners on a variety of mattress types and enables them to produce exactly what they think the consumer wants. Everyone is looking to differentiate, and we want to offer as many solutions to our partners as we can.”
Leggett & Platt’s IDEA Center: Driving Bedding Innovation and R&D
With all the products that L&P brings to market, the company looks for ways to better serve consumers, as well as manufacturers, Jewett says. The nerve center for this effort is the IDEA Center, a research and development hub at L&P’s headquarters in Carthage that supports the company’s bedding innovations worldwide. The IDEA Center has an in-house team of about 100, including about 50 engineers, that work on R&D. Globally, the company has another 100 to 200 employees engaged in product and machinery development, as well as a foam R&D team at Peterson Chemical Technologies, part of its specialty foam unit, Jewett says.
“Our goal with IDEA (an acronym that stands for innovation, design, engineering and acceleration) is to provide a constant stream of innovative product development and quality engineered solutions that benefit our customers — and the world,” Jewett says.
Ideas for new products come from everywhere — from customers, from L&P field offices, from L&P factories, from the IDEA team itself, Jewett says, adding that engineers at the IDEA Center are particularly good at taking concepts from customers and turning them into workable products. They also are adept at exploring new ideas and concepts that challenge existing thinking, he says.
“What will the sleep surface look like five years down the road, and what’s the best way to produce it?” Jewett asks. “Those questions are very important to us.”
The Spühl Advantage: Driving L&P’s Coil Innovation and Efficiency
L&P’s Spühl operation in Wittenbach, Switzerland, also plays a key role in the company’s product development strategy. Founded in 1877 and purchased by L&P in 1997, Spühl produces wire-forming machines that give L&P a competitive advantage by enabling it to produce highly engineered wire coils that use less steel. This vertical integration helps ensure that the company remains on the leading edge of coil production, Zanatta says.
Machines manufactured by Spühl can make coils ranging from 1 to 11 inches tall and 1 to 4 inches in diameter.
“We believe that Spühl designs and produces equipment that is second to none when it comes to innerspring production,” Jewett adds. “The Swiss quality and engineering are in a league of their own.”
The depth of L&P’s vertical integration also sets its bedding products division apart from its competition. Not only does L&P offer a full line of innersprings, foundations and comfort layers, it produces specialty foam chemicals and additives, specialty foams, private-label finished mattresses and foam bedding accessories through Elite Comfort Solutions, which it acquired in 2019. It also produces its own wire for innersprings from steel rod that it makes at its own mill in Sterling, Illinois.
“Our vertical integration enables us to maintain a high level of quality in everything we produce,” Jewett says. “There’s a precision and consistency that we feel sets us apart.”
Having Elite Comfort Solutions as part of the L&P family also provides the company with a deeper view into the consumer’s mindset, generating new insights that help guide product development, Jewett adds.
“Instead of focusing on the two or three ingredients that go into a pocketed coil system, we now have the ability to explore a host of different comfort materials,” he says. “We can look at new ways materials can be combined to improve the sleep experience and also figure out better ways to integrate materials that benefit the mattress manufacturer.”
Streamlining Operations: The Benefits of Leggett & Platt’s Strategic Restructuring
Last year was another tough year for the bedding industry. In earnings reports, L&P said its bedding products segment suffered from weak demand in both the U.S. and European markets. The company also faced growing pressure from foreign competitors, as some manufacturers sourced a greater portion of components offshore. In addition, low-end mattress imports gained a bigger share of the online bedding market via megaretailers such as Amazon and Wayfair, resulting in a loss of market share for domestic manufacturers.
To address these market pressures and better align with consumer preferences that have shifted over time, L&P’s management implemented a restructuring plan in January 2024 that created a more efficient manufacturing and distribution footprint. The plan resulted in the closure of 14 of the company’s 50 bedding facilities worldwide, with much of the company’s domestic innerspring manufacturing consolidated into four large plants.
In a Feb. 13 announcement of 2024 financial results and follow-up calls with financial analysts, President and CEO Karl Glassman said L&P expects economic uncertainty in 2025. “But we continue to focus on strengthening our balance sheet, improving operational efficiency and margins, and positioning the company for long-term growth,” he said. “I am confident that the actions we are taking will improve profitability and create long-term shareholder value.”
Over time, as consumer confidence and the housing market improve, L&P expects that many consumers “will want to get back to quality products with more comfort, giving us optimism for a recovery that moves back to the mid-range and higher price points,” says Tyson Hagale, president of the bedding products segment.
Going forward, L&P will maintain its focus on creating new opportunities and identifying ways to better serve its customers, Zanatta says.
“Coming out of the Las Vegas Market in January, the term we heard a lot was ‘cautiously optimistic.’ With so many variables affecting the market, including tariffs and sustained inflation, nobody is ready to say we’ve turned the corner from the downturn everyone has been dealing with,” Zanatta says. “But we’re not waiting for the market to turn around. We’re continuing to develop new products and find new ways to help people sleep better.”
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