Question:

Who is the best leather sleeper manufacturer?

Judy.

Sept. 30, 2020

Answer:

American Leather makes a line of leather sofa sleepers using their own mechanisms, which are better than most.

In general, I do not recommend that people buy leather sleeper sofas.

Sleeper Mechanism Manufacturing

Leggett & Platt and Hickory Springs, two huge global manufacturers, make vast majority of sleeper mechanisms sold in the U.S.

There is a surprisingly small number of different sleeper mechanisms available to U.S. manufacturers. Most of these are mass produced in Asia in huge quantities. This results in expensive and cheaper sleepers having mechanisms that are similar or identical.

Today, no one makes sleeper mechanisms that are anywhere near as durable as the ones sold in the 1950s by Castro Convertibles (the original inventor of the pull-out sleeper).

Sleeper Sofa Construction

In addition:

The construction requirements of sleeper sofas eliminate the quality difference between high and lower-end furniture.

For example, high-end manufacturers often point to features such as 8-way hand-tied foundations and solid wood frames to emphasize their high quality standards. Those features are not possible with sleepers. There is no room for 8 way hand tied (or other high quality) foundation systems.

Sleeper mechanisms must be mounted inside a plywood box. Nobody makes this box out of solid wood. The sleeper mechanism and the mattress are the sleeper’s support foundation.

Good leather magnifies the difference in quality between sleepers and regular sofas. One major reason for investing in high quality leather furniture is to have something that will last for the rest of your life. That won’t happen with a sleeper.

This results in leather that will last 20 years or more covering up a piece of furniture that is not built as well as a stationary sofa from the same company. Not to mention, the sleeper mechanism won’t even last half as long.

Retailer Transparency (or Lack Thereof)

Retailers and manufacturers rarely inform customers that sleepers have lower quality construction than seating made by the same brand. It is confusing to the public and detracts from the quality image that the brands try so hard to project.

In most cases, the product description for a sleeper sofa was actually written for a stationary sofa and is not accurate for the sleeper version.

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