Sleep Cult, a Canadian made hybrid mattress brand built around black, neon lit branding and a “sleep isn’t a routine, it’s a ritual” message, opened its first showroom this past Wednesday at 52 St. Lawrence St. in Toronto.
To build the mattress itself, founder Nathan Nielson worked with a local Toronto manufacturer and other industry experts, spending roughly a year designing what became the Sleep Cult hybrid.
“I wanted to know how do we make the best mattress in Canada, so I brought in people who know mattresses inside and out, people who test them, take them apart and know what actually makes one good or bad. There was no one better to build this with. We spent the past year designing the mattress together. The branding was mine to solve. I wanted something people would recognize and want to be part of, not another beige, forgettable mattress brand. That’s where Sleep Cult came from: the black branding, the darker look, something built to stand out,” he said.
The result is a twelve inch, six layer hybrid mattress featuring a cooling cover finished with phase change material, a perforated airflow mesh, gel infused comfort foam, a stability layer, and a zoned pocket coil support system on a high density base, all built with CertiPUR certified foams. Pricing starts at 1,199 dollars, with a queen landing around 1,699 dollars, a step above mass market direct to consumer names like Endy.
“People spend fifty thousand dollars on a car but only a thousand on a mattress, even though they sleep on it eight hours a night. I wanted this mattress to stay affordable, but I wasn’t going to cut anything that mattered just to hit a price point. Comfort, stability and support came first, and the price followed. Everything I’ve learned from manufacturers and reviewers over the years is built into this mattress,” said Nielson.
Every mattress ships with a 365 night trial and a warranty running up to fifteen years, along with free shipping across Canada. Nielson said that trial period matters more than ever in a market where online reviews are increasingly hard to trust.
“Between AI generated reviews and spoofed content, people have been burned online. But you can’t fake sleeping on a mattress for a year. If it isn’t right, we come pick it up, donate it if it’s in good condition, and give you your money back. That’s how we earn trust instead of just asking for it,” he said.
Customer experience is something Nielson says he obsessed over long before the showroom opened, building out documentation and training around every point where a customer might interact with the brand, including shipping delays that are largely out of a mattress company’s control once a courier takes over.
“If we tell you three days and it’s going to be late, we want to already be reaching out to you before you have to reach out to us. That’s the kind of thing I care about, every touchpoint, every detail. I’ve spent a lot of time building out the flows and training the team to be on par with that,” said Nielson.
Sleep Cult is the second act for Nielson, who spent the past decade building an earlier Toronto mattress company before deciding the category needed something more premium, more personal, and built around a physical space rather than a paid ad budget.
Nielson co-founded that earlier brand, Hamuq, with Jordan Bedwell, who had been selling mattresses alongside his father for years before pitching Nielson and a group of local manufacturers on building Canada’s first rollable coil and spring mattress. The two launched Hamuq together, selling what they billed as the first rollable hybrid mattress sold online in Canada, manufactured with Canadian partners Galaxy, VitaFoam and FineCotton. Hamuq built its brand in part around carbon neutral shipping and a program donating one mattress for every ten sold to charities across the country.
“I’ve been in this industry for ten years. Over that time I wanted to build something more premium, something that stood apart instead of blending in. I wanted a showroom and a brand that grew organically, where customers actually know the owner. That’s something I never got to do the first time around,” said Nielson.
Nielson says the pandemic reshaped the mattress business faster than anyone expected, pushing an industry that still leaned heavily on in-store, commission-driven sales into an online-first category almost overnight. He points to the rise of bed-in-a-box brands as the clearest sign of that shift, and says people spending more time and money on their homes during lockdowns only reinforced how much sleep quality actually matters to people.
“COVID sped everything up. We were already online with Hamuq, so we were positioned to take advantage of that shift when everybody else jumped online too. And I think it lasted. Sleep is only becoming more important to people, especially younger generations. That’s really the idea behind Sleep Cult: sleep isn’t a routine anymore, it’s a ritual. It affects everything in your life, and that trend isn’t going away,” he said.
Keeping manufacturing in Canada, Nielson said, is part of what let the business keep moving through disruptions that have hit other mattress companies harder.
“We were lucky that everything was made in Canada, so our supply chain never changed, even through COVID. Being close to your manufacturers matters, especially now with the tariff situation in the US. Having that control over your suppliers and your shipping is what lets you build something people actually trust and recommend,” said Nielson.
Nielson found the showroom space before the brand was fully formed, and says the two came together at nearly the same time. Being downtown, and being surrounded by other early stage entrepreneurs in the same building, mattered to him as much as the product itself.
“Being downtown was important because that’s where everything happens. Being around other entrepreneurs building things is what gets a brand off the ground. There’s a certain energy to being surrounded by that many people building something at the same time, and I wanted to be part of it. This building fits the brand perfectly. It has its own aesthetic and its own vibe, and the moment you walk in, you know you’re somewhere different,” he said.
Nielson grew up in Peterborough, and points to that small town upbringing often when explaining how he runs the business. He says it shaped both his instinct to stay personally reachable to customers and his insistence on following through publicly on what he says he’s going to do, something he says he sees plenty of founders fail to do once the initial excitement of a launch wears off.
“Where I’m from, when you say you’re going to do something, you do it, or people are going to know about it. I’ve seen a lot of founders post big announcements and then go quiet for a year. I don’t want to be that. If I say something’s happening, it’s happening,” said Nielson.
The name itself took work to land on. Nielson says the exact domain he wanted was already taken, which is part of why the brand operates as Sleep Cult Official on social media and currently holds only the dot ca web address.
The mattress is only the first product. Nielson says he is already developing additional items, including a more affordable version of a liquid cooled mattress cover for people who sleep hot, pointing to Eight Sleep as an example of what already exists in that space, with covers that run close to 3,000 dollars plus a monthly membership fee. Pillows and sheets are also on the roadmap.
“I’m obsessed with sleep. I’m not even a great sleeper myself, so I’m always looking for ways to make it better for people. My sights are set high for this brand. It has real potential to go viral, and it’s backed by a product that actually delivers. Right now the focus is getting everything tight: the process, the manufacturing, the shipping partners, the team. If the right retail partnerships come along, I’ll move fast, but I want the foundation solid first,” said Nielson.
Growth for now will stay appointment and showroom led rather than ad driven, though Nielson isn’t ruling out additional locations, unconventional retail placements, or eventually the United States, once trade conditions settle.
“I’d love to get this mattress into other furniture stores, or even alternative retail spaces that have room for a display, places like the newer cannabis shops with all that open floor space. It’s more of a guerrilla style approach, building trust and brand awareness one touchpoint at a time instead of just buying ads,” he said.
Sleep Cult’s showroom is located at 52 St. Lawrence St., Unit 209, Toronto. More information and appointment booking is available at sleepcult.ca.
Dustin Fuhs is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of 6ix Retail, Toronto’s premier source for retail and hospitality industry news. As the former Editor-in-Chief of Retail Insider, Canada’s most-read retail trade publication, Dustin brings over two decades of expertise spanning retail, marketing, entertainment and hospitality sectors. His experience includes roles with industry giants such as The Walt Disney Company, The Hockey Hall of Fame, The Canadian Opera Company, Starbucks Canada and Blockbuster.
Recognized as a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert in 2024, 2025 and 2026, Dustin delivers insider perspectives on Toronto’s evolving retail landscape, from emerging brands to established players reshaping the city’s commercial districts.