Sealy Mattress Company is a major mattress manufacture. The company draws it's name from the city where it started, Sealy, Texas. According the Sealy's website, they are the largest manufacture of mattresses in the world. Sealy sells the majority of it's mattresses under it's 3 main brands; Sealy Posturepedic, Stearns & Foster, and Bassett. A mattress is a piece of bedding typically consisting of multiple layers of foams and fibers, along with an innerspring unit used to provide support to ones back during sleep. ... Manufacturing is the transformation of raw materials into finished goods for sale, or intermediate processes involving the production or finishing of semi-manufactures. ... Sealy is a city located in Austin County, Texas. ...

History

In 1881 a cotton gin builder Daniel Haynes making cotton-filled mattresses for his friends and neighbors. In 1889 he patented an invention that compressed cotton for use in his mattresses. Eventually the mattresses became so popular he was able to sell the patents to manufactures in other markets. The term "Mattress from Sealy" was coined to describe what was produced. A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to a person for a fixed period of time in exchange for the regulated, public disclosure of certain details of a device, method, process or composition of matter (substance) (known as an invention) which is new, inventive, and...

After much success an advertising executive, Earl Edwards, purchased the pattens and and manufacturing knowledge from Haynes. Edwards took the name "Sealy" for his new company and expanded it to a national market.

Due to lack of funding for manufacturing, Sealy expanded used a licensing-expansion similar to Coca-Cola. By 1920, Sealy had 28 licensed plants. Sealy was the first mattress company to expand using a licensing program. How to obtain a amature radio licence differs from country to country. ... The wave shape (known as the dynamic ribbon device) present on all Coca-Cola cans throughout the world derives from the contour of the original Coca-Cola bottles. ...

In the Great Depression the mattress industry was hit hard. Sealy lost most of it's licensees and narrowly escaped bankruptcy itself. During the time Sealy consolidated with the surviving licensees and created what is now know as "Sealy, Incorporated" Dorothea Langes Migrant Mother depicts destitute pea pickers in California, centering on Florence Owens Thompson, a mother of seven children, age 32, in Nipomo, California, March 1936. ... Notice of closure stuck on the door of a computer store the day after its parent company, Granville Technology Group Ltd, declared bankruptcy (strictly, administration - see text) in the UK. Bankruptcy is a legally declared inability or impairment of ability of an individual or organization to pay their creditors. ...

Sealy was taken private in April of 1989 by a leveraged buyout. A leveraged buyout (or LBO, or highly-leveraged transaction (HLT), or bootstrap transaction) occurs when a financial sponsor gains control of a majority of a target companys equity through the use of borrowed money or debt. ...

Bain Capital and a team of Sealy's senior executives acquired the company in 1997. The Company operates as a privately held corporation ever since.

Oversees markets

There are licensees operating in Australia, Bahamas, Israel, Jamaica, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa, Thailand and The United Kingdom. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a country in western Europe, and a member of the European Union. ...

In 1995, direct export business began to South Korea.

In 1996, Sealy began manufacturing and selling in Mexico.

Sources

• Sealy background information
• Review of Sealy mattress

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