Manufacturers of mattresses and basic bedding, particularly those that have been focusing on quality of sleep in their marketing, have gotten a huge boost from the Superbowl champion New York Giants.
According to press reports earlier this week, a number of players on the Giants have been dealing with back injuries which they attributed to the beds they are sleeping on at their training facility in Albany, N.Y. This should come as no surprise considering the circumstances. The Giants are staying in a dormitory in which the players are forced to sleep in twin-sized beds.
The Giants’ roster includes defensive tackle Shaun Rogers, who weighs 350 pounds; defensive tackle Linval Joseph, weighing 323; offensive tackles James Brewer and Will Beatty, 330 and 320, respectively; and defensive tackle Marvin Austin, weighting 310. “We are big humans,” observed Martellus Bennett, the Giants’ very perceptive tight end.
Now just picture each of these masses of humanity parking himself on a twin dormitory mattress—one that is not only too small, but that has likely been slept on by numerous other masses of humanity, large and small. These guys are lucky to have only bad backs.
Certainly a vendor of mattresses and/or bedding can step forward to help these poor millionaires. Imagine the gratitude of the Giants toward any such manufacturer who relieves their aching bodies with a top-quality mattress (hopefully a queen or a king, rather than a twin).
And there is a further opportunity here. Many professional sports teams have official vendors in a variety of product and service categories, ranging from food and beverages to watches, electric shavers, travel agents and resort spas. There is no reason why a vendor can’t arrange to become “the official memory-foam mattress manufacturer of the champion New York Giants,” or of some other team that’s willing to go along with this.
Imagine such a team hoisting a championship trophy, and players publicly thanking So-And-So Co. for arranging for them to sleep on quality mattresses throughout the season.
There is business to be done in all sorts of odd places.—David Gill