Amazon Snags Tuft & Needle Exclusive Mattress Line

To add to the Tuft & Needle assortment already offered on Amazon, the digital brand is rolling out an Amazon exclusive collection. The line, which is called “Nod by Tuft & Needle,” offers bed-in-a-box mattresses, Chain Store Age reported.

The brand is offering king, California king, queen, full-size, twin and twin XL mattresses through the site. Already, the brand has a quarter of its sales going through Amazon. And last year the company brought put an Amazonian twist on its Seattle location, bringing in tablets that allow customers to read Amazon product reviews as well as Echo devices with Alexa to help with questions from customers.

The rollout comes on the heels of news that the brand merged with Serta Simmons Bedding. With the deal, direct-to-consumer functions from Tuft & Needle would be brought into the name brands of Serta Simmons Bedding such as Serta, Simmons, Tomorrow and Beautyrest.

On another note, Amazon is taking a new approach to its brands by extending beyond its private-label lines such as AmazonBasics: that is, the retailer is rolling out brands that are exclusive to the platform, but are not actually owned by the company. One Click Retail noted in a recent report that expansion of private-label brands has been a top priority for Amazon, but the retailer is reportedly now focusing on bringing Amazon-exclusive brands made by manufacturers such as First Quality.

Earth + Eden, First Quality’s Amazon-exclusive brand, differs from Amazon’s private-label brands because it is both owned and manufactured by First Quality. Yet the move may be seen as unusual, as First Quality is working with the same retailer that offers a competing diaper private-label brand called Mama Bear. That product line saw explosive growth in the beginning of the year, as its sales jumped by more than 40 percent from the second to third quarter.