When you think about life’s big decisions, I can guarantee that pondering which mattress to buy probably isn’t up there. But it should be. Think about it. The average adult sleeps eight hours a night (clearly not a parent), seven nights a week, fifty two weeks of the year. That’s a third of your year spent lying on something, even if you’re not sleeping, so yes, choosing the right mattress is a big decision.

A couple of months ago, we needed to buy a new mattress for our spare room makeover. Having done a bit of research there was a clear fore-runner; Simba. The Simba Hybrid Mattress has over 35,000 five star reviews making it difficult to choose anything else. We spoke to them and they agreed to let us test out a mattress for them, providing we gave an honest review afterward of how we got on, read on to find out more…

Simba Hybrid Mattress Review

As a company, Simba set themselves one goal when engineering their mattresses; the perfect night’s sleep. Using expert knowledge, a hybrid of memory foam, pocket springs and their unique Simbatex (a synthetic latex that doesn’t trap heat and adds comfort) they created a rolled mattress that has gained an impressive following. Available in a variety of sizes from cot mattress all the way up to emperor, our small double, or indeed a normal double mattress, would usually set you back £599.

Delivery

Like most busy parents, taking in deliveries can be a bit of a nightmare but for the majority of buyers, delivery is next day. Living in a rural location, deliveries were limited to two days of the week; Wednesdays and Saturdays. We were called to book in the delivery shortly after receiving our order confirmation and given a rough delivery window. Prior to arrival, I got a phone call from the driver to check we were home and confirm the timings and voila, up they turned! The mattress arrived in a surprisingly small (but heavy!) box and was left in our hall as requested as it’s final home was still being decorated.

Simba offer a free mattress recycling service, if you let them know at the time of ordering, they’ll take away your old mattress for you and get it recycled. Hallelujah! A way to get rid of the old without having to somehow manhandle it into/onto the car and drive perilously to the tip. Unfortunately, we decided to keep our old mattress to use in another bedroom, a decision we’ll probably regret in a few years when we try and get rid!

Unboxing

Possibly the most intriguing part of our mattress trial, the unboxing had all of us gathered around to see how a double mattress could appear out of a box that was less than a quarter of it’s size. Opening the box we found the mattress vacuum packed, folded and then rolled. We lifted it onto the base in the bedroom and laid it out flat, be warned, it’s heavier than it looks! Using the special cutter included inside the box, we cut open the vacuum packaging and unleashed the mattress itself. Incredibly, the moment we cut it, it started to spring to life and within moments we had a thick mattress exactly like you’d expect with a traditional one! Simba advise that you leave the mattress for 24 hours to allow it to firm up but we couldn’t help but have a sneaky lie down. We left the toddler making a home out of the box and ‘rested our eyes’ for the briefest of moments. Bliss.

Tell Me More…

Let’s cut straight to the potential pinch point. It’s not cheap. You can pick up a mattress for far less at any number of places and it can be hard to justify such a large outlay. Until you look at how much you’ll be using it; the Better Sleep Council recommend you change your mattress every seven to ten years. So that’s 365 nights a year for a minimum of seven years, that’s 2,555 nights at least (give or take). A regular double mattress will set you back £599, making it 23p a night. Or 2.8p an hour if you get your standard eight. And that’s if you change it after seven years. Pretty cheap in reality for comfort.

Each Simba Hybrid mattress comes with a 100 night guarantee, meaning that you can give it a comprehensive test and if you don’t like it, you can return it free of charge. In practice, Simba recommend you wait at least 30 days in order to give it a proper test but after that just call their customer service line or drop them an email. As someone who’s more than a little fussy about their sleep surface, this is invaluable. We all know how devastating it can be to try such an investment and have a Goldilocks moment of it being too hard or too soft.

I love that it adjusts to all different sorts of sleepers due to it’s mix of pocket springs and memory foam. Our mattress is going in to a spare bedroom so it’s important that it’s up to the job of making our guests comfortable, regardless of their preference. It’s makeup also means that one person can get out of the bed without disturbing their sleep partner, although I can only take their word on this given that the testing I’ve done, I’ve snuck in there alone.

The mattress also comes with a ten year guarantee, something that wouldn’t be given if they didn’t believe in the quality. Again, reassuring when you’re parting with a sizeable amount of money. To me, it’s clear that Simba pride themselves on offering exceptional service throughout the entire process and this comes across in their marketing, information and attitude.

Yeah, But What’s It Like To Sleep On?

My husband described it as ‘INCREDIBLE’. The toddler routinely climbs on to it to it to play dens. The baby sleeps like, well, a baby on it. Me? Initially it felt a little too soft and squishy for my liking. I was also a little concerned that I’d end up stuck in one position all night (previous experience of memory foam left me with a dead arm after getting stuck in one groove!) However, I quickly found that first impressions can be deceiving and I had a very comfortable night’s sleep. Even if it was shorter than I hoped for. But hey, that’s parenthood.

Would We Buy One?

As fussy sleepers, we’ve both been hugely impressed with our Simba Hybrid Mattress. Given that ours is in the spare bedroom, the fact that it adjusts to suit different sleeping preferences means our guests will be happy whatever their mattress preference. Having reviewed one and (sleep) tested it thoroughly, it’s not the cheapest mattress out there but the levels of both service and more importantly, comfort, are excellent. I’d be more than happy to part with my money safe in the knowledge that if I wasn’t a fan, I could call on that 100 night guarantee to get my money back. But you won’t need to, because it really does give a great night’s sleep. Now I just need to find more excuses to sleep in the spare room…