Why Change Your Pillows?

You may not know this but your pillow is home to around forty thousand microscopic mites, which are often not spoken about and are overlooked. Due to this we’re going to be talking about these unwelcome guests, and inform you as too why you should change your pillow. 

Dust Mites enjoying breakfast (or lunch)

Reason 1: Dust Mites

“It’s fine I’ll just wash my pillow.” Simply doing this won’t get rid of these mites as the heat needed to kill them would have to be so high that it would damage the fabric and fade any colour. So by buying a new pillow you’re completely getting rid of all those mites that have made a home in your pillow. 

Reason 2: Dust Mites (again)

According to a study by Dr John Maunder, Director of the Medical Entomology Centre at Cambridge, by the time your pillow gets to its average age of 6 years one tenth of its weight will be made up of skin scales, living mites, dead mites and mite poo! 

Therefore you’re no longer sleeping on what you thought was a freshly cleaned pillow but a pillow filled with dead skin, a mite colony and mite waste. 

Here are a few more chilling facts about these creepy creatures:

  • Related to the spider, they’re really tiny (about a 1/4 mm in length) and translucent, so just about impossible to spot with the naked eye.
  • They feed on your dead skin flakes, which are lying all around your bed and pillow.
  • There are 100-500 mites in a typical gram of dust.
  • Whilst they really like your mattress, they really love your pillow. An average pillow is home to about 40,000 mites.
  • According to mite expert John Maunder, Director of the Medical Entomology Centre at Cambridge, if you’re using a six-year-old pillow, about one tenth of its weight will consist of human skin scales, living mites, dead mites, and mite poo!
  • When people are allergic to dust, they’re actually allergic to mite poo, specifically a digestive enzyme it contains. A female mite lives about 10 weeks, and in addition to laying 60-100 eggs in that time, she’ll poo about 2,000 times. However, many more than 2,000 dust particles will be covered with her poo by the time she dies!

Reason 3: Dead Skin Scales

As a few of you shop with us to buy products for your businesses like B&Bs and guest houses, we wouldn’t want your customers to be sleeping on someone else’s dead skin cells. Each visitor is transferring different mites to the pillow each time a guest sleeps. We advice buying new pillows so your customers have the best stay and healthiest stay as possible. 

At Barretts Of Woodbridge we are currently in our Summer Sale and can offer you up to 50% off pillows. We are Covid-19 secure so our health and your health are protected while you shop with us. We also provide free parking at the back of our store, as well as a loyalty card scheme so you gain points while shopping with us. So come on down to our store and replace your pillows. We look forward to seeing you!