Bean Bag City ® vs. our Competitors

Bean Bag City® sews flat-felled seams with 2 rows of lockstitches which do not allow thread motion in the stitch holes. The 2 pieces of material are actually rolled together interlocking their edges. Both needles are always sewing through 3 or 4 layers of material. Now all the strain of the seam is on the fabric itself and not on the stitching. The stitching just holds the fold from unrolling. We use color matched dacron thread (soft but strong) for a rich appealing finish. When you sit on our chairs, the seams are designed to hold themselves together instead of pulling directly on the threads.

"Flat-Felled Seam = a seam on the face of a garment, as on the outside of the legs of blue jeans, made by overlapping or interlocking one seam allowance with the other and top-stitching them together onto the garment with two parallel rows of stitches." (Webster dictionary)

Bean Bag City® uses automotive upholstery velvets, double-ply Simsuedes, 16 oz. denims, and thicker more durable vinyl that looks and feels like real leather. This is a commercial strength fabric that is many times stronger than the thin plastic-look vinyl found in other, (imported beanbags). The budget bean bags typically split at the seams after only 2 weeks to 6 months. If you look closely and examine the seams of discount store's bean bag furniture, you can usually find a few of them on the store shelf still in the store, already starting to rip at the seams due to their low grade seams and materials.

Our heavier materials prevent ripping at the seams and withstand years of use. We insist, where possible, on 18oz. vinyl*, and 16 oz. cottons.

*This weight is based on an actual single square yard of the material measuring 36 inches by 36 inches.

Unlike our competitors, Bean Bag City® reinforces the tops and the bottoms of all its bean bags. This reinforcing helps stabilize the material and keeps the chair from ripping in these high strain areas. We also sew around the tops 3 times, and the bottoms have 4 rows of stitching to prevent bead dust from escaping and to increase durability.

The chair on the right is a competitor's chair which shows NO reinforcements. Their sewing puts the strain 100% on a single layer of material. It has 1 row of stitching to hold in the top and only 2 rows at the bottom. Note the bunched up puckered top seam. When stretched, puckered seams tear the stitch holes and start leaking.

Competitors chair reveals no reinforcing on the inside

Bean Bag City's® bean bag furniture features 2 hefty #5 boot zippers to keep the polystyrene bead filler…inside. All our bean bags have double zippers, one over the top of the other. These double nylon zippers always zip smoothly and do not lose their teeth. Our unique end tab design makes them childproof. The zipper sliders are hidden deep beneath 2 end tabs, and cannot be opened by curious toddlers. When it's time to add filler, they can be opened easily by using a crochet hook or a bent paperclip to "fish" out the slider from under the tab. These hide-a-way tabs also keep scratchy zippers covered up and hidden so they can never jab or scratch you or your hardwood floors.

Bean bag chairs aren't really filled with real beans. The soft, cushiony feel comes from tiny polystyrene beads. Bean Bag City® uses 100% new modified polystyrene beans in tiny irregular shapes in all our bean bag chairs. These tiny irregular shaped beans help our bean bag furniture retain its shape when you get up from the chair. Round beans just roll to the bottom leaving the chair to look like a formless blob. Our irregular shaped beans help the chair retain its shape and provide a level of support not found in other bean bags.

We have found some other bean bag manufacturers actually do use recycled materials from the local landfill. Some of our customers have brought in bean bags they have purchased elsewhere, and we found them filled with porous, crumbly styrene chunks (up to the size of quarters and half dollars), foam rubber, ground up athletic shoes, scraps of fabric, shredded cardboard, and all manner of foreign bits and pieces. The hazards presented by this sort of fill are obvious, not to mention the lumpy, uncomfortable seating surface they give. We absolutely do not use this type of junk in our filler. Ohio polices this, but not all states do.