How to Choose an Avocado Mattress
Created with AvocadoThey say in Los Angeles that your car is the ultimate status symbol. Maybe it’s because I’m a wellness editor or because I drive a Honda Civic, but I’ve never cared much about that. What I do covet—what I consider the ultimate luxury—is sleep. Good sleep. The kind of consistently good sleep that makes you patient and kind and outperforms the most expensive eye cream on the market. When someone has that, you know.
To that end, I’ve always aspired to follow the path of my most well-rested coworkers and get an Avocado Green Mattress. Avocado mattresses are end game: They’re made with GOTS- and GOLS-certified organic materials (and not made with stuff you don’t want to sleep on, like fiberglass, flame retardants, and polyurethane foam). They have 10-to-25-year warranties and some of the nicest customer service people you’ll ever talk to. And lying down on one, even just for a minute, makes you feel like a new mattress could fix your whole life.
I moved to a new apartment a few months ago and it was finally time. All I needed to do was figure out which mattress was best for me. “Every Avocado mattress is good for someone, but not all the mattresses are good for everyone,” says Billy Kahn, an assistant store manager of brand experience at Avocado’s new Flatiron store in New York City. (There are 14 Avocado stores in the US.) Kahn is used to chatting with indecisive people like me—I had spent time at the Santa Monica store, lying for a few minutes on each of their three most popular mattresses and feeling it out, Goldilocks-style. But I needed to understand more about why each mattress felt the way it did.
Here, Kahn breaks it down for us.
-
Eco Organic Mattress
Starting at $777
Eco Organic Mattress
Starting at $777
This is Avocado’s newest mattress, and its most competitively priced. It’s made of organic cotton, organic sheep’s wool, organic latex, and a recycled steel coil system. (Like all Avocado mattresses, the materials are MADE SAFE–certified nontoxic.) “Compared to the other mattresses, the Eco is a little bit softer because the coil system is different,” Kahn says. “It’s reminiscent of what many people would consider a traditional spring mattress.” The edge support is very similar to that of the other two mattresses, but the center has a supportive layer of latex that prevents you from feeling like the heaviest parts of your body are sinking in. Because it’s more of a classic spring mattress, the trial period is 100 days—you’ll know within a few months whether it’s right for you.
-
Avocado Green Mattress
Starting at $1,399
Avocado Green Mattress
Starting at $1,399
This is the mattress that started it all. It’s made of the same base materials as the Eco, but it’s more supportive—there are five zones of coil support, compared to the Eco’s three. “You have that extra support in the center, which tends to be the heaviest part of the body for everyone, so that you get that better spinal alignment and overall support,” Kahn says. And, notably, it has a secondary layer of latex underneath the coil system, which adds comfort.
Avocado gives you a yearlong trial period: “Because it’s our patented coil system, it can take a little bit of getting used to—not everyone is used to that specific level of support in the center,” Kahn says.
-
Luxury Organic Mattress
Starting at $2,779
Luxury Organic Mattress
Starting at $2,779
This is the mattress that feels like sleeping in a cloud. Which sounds like heaven, but Kahn notes is not for everyone. “That is overall the softest product that we offer. It’s meant to be very cradling and very comfortable,” Kahn says. The Luxury mattress has all the same components as the Green—the organic cotton, the organic sheep’s wool, the organic latex, and the recycled steel coil system. But it also has layers of an alpaca wool, silk, and cotton combination, which is made into a padding that weaves between each of the layers of latex and around the whole coil system. The effect is sturdier support and more shock absorption. “It’s great for couples who maybe have varied sleep schedules, or just someone’s a light sleeper and the other person is not,” Kahn says.
-
The Toppers
The Toppers
Avocado offers two kinds of organic latex toppers for the Green—a plush topper and a firm topper. They’re two additional inches of latex, and the latter option is a denser kind of latex. “Despite its name, the intention of the firm topper is not to make the mattress feel any firmer,” Kahn says. “The intention of the topper is to make the mattress that it’s on feel just a little bit softer.” The plush option is the same, just…more plush (and less dense).
For the luxury mattress, you can opt in to a sewn-in topper, which is what’s pictured in the cross-section above. (It’s more complex and involves an extra layer of coils, padding, and latex.)
Making the Choice
I went with the Avocado Green Mattress with the plush topper. Kahn was right—transitioning from my former all-foam mattress to one with such supportive springs took a bit of adjusting. The topper doesn’t change that support, but it does make the mattress feel more plush, which I love. It’s been a few months, and I’ve never slept better.
And I still have something to look forward to: I’m thinking in my 40s, when I’ve (hopefully) entered both a new stage of life and a higher tax bracket, it will be time for the Luxury Organic Mattress.
P.S. If you’re reading this on November 29, you may wish to hit the final day of Avocado’s cyber sale.