Mattress Firm
Mattress Firm is one of the largest mattress retailers in the country, operating at a scale where creative never slows down. As Design Manager within a large marketing organization, I led a team responsible for concept and execution across multi-channel campaigns, brand standards, partner co-branding, and national broadcast. I built the team, created the systems, and delivered the work, quarter after quarter, on tight deadlines, without dropping quality.
Scope
Campaigns, Brand, Retail, Digital, Video, Creative Operations, Partner Co-Branding
Role
Design Manager
The Environment
Mattress Firm runs on promotions. Every quarter brought a new campaign, a new look and feel, and a full suite of creative deliverables that had to be conceived, designed, and executed across every channel simultaneously.
That meant TV spots, billboards, printed newspaper ads, in-store signage, digital, and all supporting print materials, all launched together, all on time. Then the cycle started over. Operating inside a large marketing organization with layers of stakeholders meant the creative had to be right before it moved up the chain, and it had to move fast. There was no room for either slow or wrong.
Brand & Co-Branding Systems
One of the most complex creative challenges at Mattress Firm wasn't the campaigns. It was the partners.
Mattress Firm carries brands with their own strong identities, Beautyrest, Purple, Tempur-Pedic, Chatham & Wells, and none of them had clear guidelines for how their brand should live alongside Mattress Firm's. I built that from scratch. I developed co-branding guidelines for each partner, defining how their visual identity should be applied within Mattress Firm's creative ecosystem, ensuring neither brand got lost in the process.
I also led a full rebrand and design system for Mattress Firm Foster Kids, creating a standalone identity built to carry its own weight across campaigns, events, and national broadcast. That system didn't exist before I built it.
And then there was mattress.com. I created the entire brand identity, design system, and in-store experience for this standalone retail concept, which launched physically in Chicago. From the visual language to the guidelines to every piece of in-store material, I built it end to end. It was a full retail brand launch, and one of the most creatively rewarding projects of my time there.
Contributed to the evolution of Mattress Firm's overall brand standards and guidelines
Developed co-branding guidelines for all major partner brands: Beautyrest, Purple, Tempur-Pedic, and Chatham & Wells
Created frameworks for how partner brands should be applied within Mattress Firm creative
Led a full rebrand and design system for Mattress Firm Foster Kids from the ground up
Created the full brand identity, design system, and in-store materials for mattress.com
Launched the mattress.com retail concept in Chicago as a standalone brand experience
Built systems and standards where none previously existed
Campaign Execution & 360 Marketing
Every quarter, I owned the look and feel of a new promotional campaign, then led my team through full execution across every channel before the deadline hit.
Each campaign required developing the creative concept and visual direction, then translating it into a complete suite of deliverables: TV spots, billboards, newspaper ads, in-store printed materials, digital assets, and all supporting creative. That work touched broadcast, out-of-home, print, and digital simultaneously, requiring tight coordination across internal teams, agency partners, and freelance talent on compressed timelines.
We did this four times a year, every year. The pace was relentless and the standard was consistent.
Concepted and defined the look and feel for each quarterly promotional campaign
Led execution of full 360 creative suites across TV, billboard, newspaper, print, and digital
Managed simultaneous multi-channel deliverables across every campaign cycle
Coordinated with internal teams, external agencies, and freelance talent to hit launch deadlines
Maintained brand consistency and creative quality across a continuous high-volume output cycle
Content, Video & Production
I led art direction across photo and video shoots, working with internal teams and agency partners to produce assets that scaled across broadcast and digital.
The most visible production of my time at Mattress Firm was a national commercial for the Foster Kids campaign, which I directed in partnership with our agency from concept through final delivery. The spot aired on national network television and was recognized both internally and externally for its impact. It balanced brand storytelling with a genuine social mission, and it required bringing together every part of the team to pull off at that level.
Art directed national photo and video shoots across campaigns
Directed a nationally aired commercial for the Mattress Firm Foster Kids campaign
Guided the spot from concept through execution in partnership with the agency
Campaign received internal and external recognition for creative impact
Led social and digital content direction across campaign cycles
Team Leadership, Social Media & Creative Operations
Mattress Firm operated with multiple design managers, each leading their own teams within a large creative organization. My focus within that structure was clear from the start: own social media and build it into something the brand could actually use.
When I came in, social was just beginning to explode as a channel and nobody had really tackled it at Mattress Firm yet. I was the first to step in and take it seriously. I created the social media guidelines and best practices from scratch, defining how the brand should show up, what the creative standards were, and how the team should operate across platforms. What I built became the foundation the broader team worked from.
Beyond social, I collaborated across the larger creative organization to support campaign execution and contributed to the cross-functional workflows that kept the quarterly cycle moving.
First to establish social media creative guidelines and best practices at Mattress Firm
Defined brand standards, creative direction, and operational best practices for social platforms
Built the social media creative framework during a period of rapid platform growth
Collaborated across multiple design manager teams within a large creative organization
Supported quarterly campaign execution across channels as part of the broader creative team
Impact
At Mattress Firm, the measure of success was simple: did the work ship on time, did it look right, and did it hold up across every channel. Quarter after quarter, it did.
4 full 360 campaigns per year, each requiring a new creative concept and complete suite of deliverables across TV, out-of-home, print, and digital, executed on tight deadlines without missing a cycle.
Co-branding guidelines built from scratch for four major partner brands, creating a system for how Mattress Firm and its partners showed up together in market for the first time.
Full rebrand and design system created for Mattress Firm Foster Kids, including a nationally aired commercial that earned recognition internally and externally.
Launched mattress.com as a standalone retail brand, creating the full identity, design system, and in-store experience for the Chicago storefront from the ground up.
First to establish social media creative guidelines and best practices at Mattress Firm, building the brand's social creative framework from scratch at the moment the channel started to matter.