> The problem is that many people like to lie on a mattress before they buy it.
One can get all of the benefit of this by selling a single mattress, but also sending 3 or 4 foam mattress toppers to choose from. Correctly designed packaging would let the customer re-roll the topper, then use a vacuum pump to collapse the rolled topper back into a compact form for return mailing. (The pumps would be cheap and disposable, so wouldn't be returned.)
Using a system like this, one could become the Zappos of mattresses. There would still be a restocking and return fee for the mattress, but one could let the customers exchange and try toppers to their heart's content, so long as they took good care of the merchandise.
One can get all of the benefit of this by selling a single mattress, but also sending 3 or 4 foam mattress toppers to choose from. Correctly designed packaging would let the customer re-roll the topper, then use a vacuum pump to collapse the rolled topper back into a compact form for return mailing. (The pumps would be cheap and disposable, so wouldn't be returned.)
Using a system like this, one could become the Zappos of mattresses. There would still be a restocking and return fee for the mattress, but one could let the customers exchange and try toppers to their heart's content, so long as they took good care of the merchandise.