October 24, 2017

Meet Pam Blumenthal of The Curvy Pillow Company, Treehugger Pillows, and Body Pillow Therapy

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Pam Blumenthal.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I invented the very first body pillow on the market when I was a self-employed housecleaner in NYC in 1988 at the age of 23, I was staring out the window at the pigeons, when I realized that I needed a pillow long enough for my whole body and it didn’t need corners. The name “Sleeping Bean” came to mind so I called it that. I traveled to Chicago and was talking about it with my cousin at the No Exit Cafe on the north side. She was a mathematician and showed me how to make a hotdog-shaped pillow out of 3 pieces of a napkin. I then went down to my mom’s in Tucson and bought some old sheets at a thrift store. On the same street was a store called A Foam and Fabric Place. In that store, I noticed a natural fiber that was silky and soft. It was called kapok and it was to become the filling for all of my pillows. Back at my mom’s, I made the first body pillows and gave them to friends and family.

They liked them so I decided to make them for sale and a friend of mine suggested that I try to sell them to Bloomingdales’. I showed them to the Bloomingdales’ pillow buyer back in NYC and he said: “It’s stupid but it will probably sell millions”. He didn’t buy them from me but suggested that I use a manufacturer that he knew in the Chicago area. I returned to Chicago and went into business with my brother. We called our company Human Bean, Inc. and made 4 sizes of body pillows, The Original Sleeping Bean, The Teen Bean, The Kidney Bean, and The Baby Bean (we called it The Human Bean Family of Body Pillows). But the manufacturer wouldn’t make them out of kapok– only down and feathers or polyester. My brother and I sold Sleeping Beans to the Spiegel Catalog, Marshall Fields, and some Scandia Down Stores. But I was not happy because they were not made out of kapok, the fiber that gives them their special natural support. My brother and I made a kapok version and offered it for sale. Then I designed The Curvy Head Pillow to go along with the body pillow. My brother and I split up and he started a factory making ecologically sound products called Bean Products. He makes all of my pillows and many other eco products. After The Curvy Head Pillow, I designed The Curvy Backrest (a transformational pillow case that can fit in your pocket for travel and is filled with 3 regular bed pillows to make a backrest wherever you happen to be), The Landing Pad, Dinosaur Egg Pillows, and various other curvy pillow shapes. They are available on Amazon and here is the link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0043ERIHC.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It’s been a long strange road with many thousands of our natural body pillows made and sold but not the millions that the Bloomingdales’ buyer predicted. That’s because the market was flooded with cheap polyester knock-0ffs and elongated rectangular bed pillows.

The difficulty has been educating the public about the importance of the natural kapok pillows for better support and the environment…while also introducing uniquely-designed shapes.

The Curvy Pillow Company, Treehugger Pillows, Body Pillow Therapy – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Our company is just about unique natural pillows that are made out of cotton and kapok (soon to be hemp and kapok). I design them. I’m known for the very first body pillow in the marketplace–The Original Sleeping Bean Body Pillow AKA Body Pillow Therapy. Physical therapists recommend it for joint-pressure relief and special positioning for injury recovery. I am proud of introducing the body pillow concept and making it out of natural materials that are better for the environment and happens to offer a special kind of support for all beings (animals love it too!) The unique shapes of the pillows are all curvy like the body. My goal has been to make a soft, natural landscape for the body at rest.

I am most proud that I came up with this thing that is not only environmentally friendly, but it also can help people with bad backs and other physical injuries to heal. Because the kapok is so stable and supportive, a person can set themselves in the best possible position for healing through the night. Just ask Athletico Physical Therapist and Orthopedic Certified Specialist, Jessica Curran.

The following is a letter from her dated July 7, 2017, entitled “PT thoughts on body pillow”:

Hi Pam, I hope your week has gone well. Just thought I would share with you some of my thoughts on the body pillow.

I feel your particular body pillow is unique in that I can chose the size that fits me best and I get better support due to the kapok material.

Size of the pillow definitely makes a difference! Initially I tried using the regular sized body pillow but it was having the opposite effect on me as it should. Since I am on the smaller side (5’1″) the pillow raised my arm/leg too high and increased pressure points, simply because I was too small for the equipment. Since I had the option of using the teen bean (thank you) I switched to that and was able to notice an immediate difference! I imagine consumers come in all shapes/sizes… so maybe figuring out a way to educate the consumer about if they are between certain heights they would benefit from a S, M, L, XL pillow size? I think customers also appreciate knowing they have a choice to personalize a fit to them.
I LOVE the kapok material. Unlike most body pillows that squish too much and don’t actually offer support, the kapok material is soft enough to give naturally for comfort, but firm enough to make a difference and support correct alignment. I never feel like I have to “re-fluff” my pillow or that it isn’t doing its job. This is especially comforting for in the middle of the night, when all I want to do is change position and be comfortable… not re-fluff my pillow.
I wear a FitBit, day and night. During the night it tracks how long and well I sleep, including my restlessness (how many times I shift position and may momentarily awake. Since starting to use the body pillow, the number of times I am restless in bed has dropped, fairly consistently. This means I am not changing positions as often in the middle of the night. I attribute this to the comfort I can find with the body pillow.
I am able to use the pillow when sleeping on my sides, back and stomach- it is great for any position I may want to be in!
The Sleeping Bean is great for positioning, meaning that weather you want to lay down on your back, stomach or side or recline, the bean can fairly effortlessly help you line up in the perfect position.
I think the pictures that show the therapeutic uses for the sleeping bean (as created by a PT) are extremely valuable to educating the consumer and demonstrate the variety of ways the body pillow can be used.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
When we first started selling the Sleeping Bean Body Pillow AKA Body Pillow Therapy, the Wall Street Journal acknowledged it as one of the hottest new things of the year…but they called them “skinny pillows”. They are actually five and a half feet long and one foot in diameter–so skinny is a relative term!

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