Brunosleep

Our experience with Bruno has not been straightforward. At first, the initial delivery was faultless, the mattress arrived quickly and the unboxing went smoothly and initial impressions were good. The mattress felt very firm compared with our old one (a 15 yr old top quality traditional sprung mattress with wool and cotton fillings), so this took time to get used to. It was also much warmed to get into (in January that was most welcome!), although towards the end of our 100 day trial in April the weather was much warmer and we had quite a few hot nights and the mattress was much sweatier than our old one. Right at the end of the trial, we were undecided, so I asked Bruno for their comments. Upon trying to call them I got a recorded message telling me to call during working hours – I was doing! Okay, so it was later on a Friday, so maybe they'd all gone home early? It was blamed on a 'technical issue'. Not impressed. We were concerned about sleeping hot (which is why I had chosen a latex mattress rather than memory foam in the first place), plus the mattress was still very firm and although supportive, neither myself or my wife were sleeping comfortably on our sides – our shoulders didn't really sink into the mattress sufficiently to be comfortable. They offered us an additional Bruno topper for the mattress but at 拢225, I felt this was an unreasonable extra cost on what should have already been a comfortable mattress at 拢675. We therefore decided to return the mattress and find an alternative. At the end of the day, all these new style 'bed in box' mattresses are just large pieces of foam and we decided that wasn't what we wanted to spend hundreds of pounds on. For very little extra we switched to a traditional mattress with natural fillings which is just as supportive and much more comfortable (thanks to a company which is never knowingly undersold). The returns process was where it all started to go wrong. First, we were encouraged to hear that British Heart Foundation would be collecting the mattress for charity (great idea), however when they arrived they declined to take it because it had no fire label. How this could be was beyond me, this was supposed to be a brand new mattress made to latest standards. Upon trying to speak to Bruno while they were making the pickup, all I could get was an answer machine message – in German! This was very stressful as I had already paid for my new mattress and no pickup meant no refund from Bruno. BHF left and I eventually made contact by email and they apologised. They arranged to send me a huge plastic bag for returning it and that Tuffnells would be in touch within 7 days to arrange the pickup. After 7 days I had not hear anything so followed up again and eventually got a call to say they would collect tomorrow. Tomorrow came and went (staying in all day for the collection) and no-one arrived. I phoned Tuffnells several times but without success until a few days later they turned up unannounced and took it away (lucky I was in). Apparently, it had been down as a 1-tonne pallet to pick up, hence they had been waiting for the right van, but no-one had bothered to phone me and explain. I have finally received my refund, 6 weeks after telling Bruno that we would be making the return. Although communications, when made, have been polite, the whole process has been a shambles and I cannot recommend either the product or the service. The reason for two rather than one star is that the product is not bad and will probably suit many people.