The UK’s leading online retailer of mattresses and beds has announced a partnership with celebrated Yorkshire-based sleep practitioner James Wilson, aka The Sleep Geek.
During the pandemic, Mattress Online saw their turnover leap to a record £37.5m, fuelled, in part, by stay-at-home spending on DIY and homeware. Now the South Yorkshire firm are celebrating an exciting new collaboration with The Sleep Geek: James Wilson.
James will be supporting and educating Mattress Online’s staff with sound sleep and wellbeing advice – helping them get to grips with the fundamentals of stress reduction, enjoying work to its fullest and providing tailor-made customer service.
Born into the world of sleep, James – a veritable sandman – is the third generation of his family to enter the world of bed and mattress retail. Working with a mattress and bed retailer was, therefore, very close to his heart.
After being on the hunt for a company that fitted with his ethos, he found Mattress Online and realised it had been right under his nose the whole time – here in his hometown of Rotherham.
In this first phase of the partnership, James will be helping with employee wellbeing but, as his work gets embedded into the Mattress Online brand, he will also be providing the company’s customer-facing staff with the tools required to help customers make the right choices for them.
What James will teach staff is, how best to give customers a personal experience and finding out what will work best for them. Sleep is a very personal experience for all, and it is important for Mattress Online that there’s no one-size-fit-all approach to their work.
The partnership aims to improve lives through better sleep by properly connecting products to problems – without traditional sales techniques getting in the way.
James Wilson, The Sleep Geek and founder of Kip Mate, known for supporting organisations such as West Ham United F.C., said:
“I’m genetically a poor sleeper, so I know first-hand the challenges involved in getting the sleep you need. Having a better understanding of our own sleep, and access to simple and effective resources to help improve it, is so valuable for good mental health and wellbeing.
“This unique partnership invests in employee wellbeing and improving employee health, which will lead to better employee engagement, better performance and productivity, and the reduction of sickness absence.
“What Mattress Online are offering to their staff is so important. No other mattress brands in the UK (possibly world-wide) are providing a service like this internally and I’m honoured to be working with them on this.”
Steve Adams, Chief Executive Officer at Mattress Online, added:
“The last 18-months of Mattress Online has been all about growth. Now we’re concentrating on investing that back into our employees. Wellbeing is rooted deep into our values as a company.
“Staff are supported, valued, and empowered to have good work/life balance and good mental health. The next stage of this is our collaboration with James.
“It’s also important to us that we recommend products to customers based on what’s best for a better night’s sleep for them. Training by James will enable our staff to demystify the mattress buying process, unpicking the myths that are engrained in the sleep industry, while advising customers on how to sleep better.”