Tired of mattress sales reps? Try a shop with no clerks

The owners of a small Midwestern furniture chain are tinkering with a quirky idea: mattress stores with no salespeople, or anyone else, around. Three towns in the Milwaukee area have received applications for the shops, which would open and close remotely, be fitted with security cameras and have no staff on the premises. Arvid Huth and his brother, Ben, confirmed that they are experimenting with what they have dubbed HASSLEss Mattress.

The plan involves an electronically opened shop stocked with test mattresses, a computer on site for further information and online ordering, a telephone number to contact, and intensive monitoring by video cameras to deter would-be mattress thieves. Underlying the Huths’ approach is the notion that many shoppers would rather not have a salesman hovering nearby as they lie down, roll about and do whatever else they might want to do to test a mattress.