DREAM CATCHING

Serta Simmons eyes Mattress Firm: sources

This couple may need a California king if it’s going to get comfy together.

The buyout firm that owns Serta Simmons, the nation’s biggest mattress maker, is actively exploring a takeover bid for Mattress Firm, the nation’s dominant mattress retailer, The Post has learned.

Execs at Advent International are considering the marriage because Mattress Firm is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy — a collapse that would slam Serta Simmons with massive losses, according to sources close to the situation.

Serta Simmons is Mattress Firm’s biggest supplier. Last year, it shelled out $100 million to launch a five-year marketing partnership with Mattress Firm and its 3,300 stores.

Likewise, if Mattress Firm were to file for bankruptcy, “Serta Simmons has to be in there for $100 million in receivables” that would go unpaid, a source close to the talks said, as the bed maker sells $50 million of its products monthly through the retailer.

Mattress Firm dropped a third bed maker, Tempur Sealy, last year in a contract dispute, and Serta Simmons believed it would be the beneficiary. Instead, “they found

out Mattress Firm was poisonous,” the source said.

Owner Steinhoff International of South Africa is reeling from an accounting scandal. During the past few weeks, its creditors have taken effective control of Steinhoff ’s operations, according to sources.

“The word is they are trying to sell Mattress Firm,” the source said.

Under Steinhoff ’s direction, Mattress Firm last year bought rival Sleepy’s for $780 million and quickly got rid of the Sleepy’s name, costing it Northeast customers. A few

months ago, Mattress Firm introduced a Sleepy’s bedding line but the damage was done, sources said.

To make matters worse, Amazon has begun selling millions of cheaper, Chinesemanufactured beds and bedin-a-box startups led by Cas-

per are stealing away more business.

Steinhoff ’s creditors would like to have a new owner backstop Mattress Firm’s losses, now running $200 million a year, a second source said. Steinhoff, which paid $2.6 billion for the company in 2016, would likely sell it for not much more than $1 billion including the assumption of debt, the source said.

Mattress Firm in recent months has lowered prices to gain lost revenue, a move that has squeezed profit margins, sources said.

Advent would need to close at least one quarter of Mattress Firm’s stores to make the retail chain profitable, sources added, which may be hard outside of a bankruptcy.

Besides Advent, buyout firm THL Partners has expressed interest.

THL in January 2017 bought furniture and mattress retailer Art Van Furniture. Since then, Art Van has acquired two more furniture retailers, giving it a combined $1.3 billion in annual revenue potential.

A sale could be part of a prepackaged Mattress Firm bankruptcy, the sources said. Lenders include both those who loaned money directly to Mattress Firm, and those who are Steinhoff lenders.

Mattress Firm, Advent and THL spokespeople didn’t immediately comment.