Making The Bed: Sheets and Four-Types of Cotton

I had a woman come into my store the other day and ask me about cotton. "Which of these towels has the best cotton?" 

I replied, "Well ma'am the best cotton we carry in towels comes in a Supima cotton." She looks at the labels and says, "I see here that most of the towels contain 100% algodón cotton even that Supima cotton has 100% algodón in it, so how is that towel the best?"

I looked her dead in her eye and told her with a straight face, "Ma'am all of these towels are 100% algodón, but you should know that algodón is Spanish for cotton."

It turns out that most people walk around with no knowledge regarding cotton despite my funny interaction with the customer. So today I want to talk about cotton.

Cotton is a complicated material, especially when you are buying sheets or towels. There are four categories you should know about: Egyptian, Supima, Pima and Upland. Egyptian cotton is generally known as the best cotton on the market, but there is a catch that I will discuss further. Supima cotton is cotton grown in the U.S.A. Pima cotton is a collective from where ever, while upland is the stuff you typically find on the $9.99 shelf.

Now Egyptian, Supima and Pima typically come from extra-long staple cotton (or ELS), which is the type of cotton best for soft long lasting sheets; however, Egyptian cotton has a very big loophole in this generalization. All cotton from Egypt does not come from extra-long staple cotton, but is still considered 100% Egyptian cotton because it all comes from Egypt. Do you see the catch? 

How can you tell the difference? 

Good-old fashioned touch and feel. Let your fingers slide across the material and use the back of your hand as an indicator. Sometimes our hands are over sensitized with antibacterial, lotion, overtexting/typing and etcetera.

Most people "think" they read the package correctly, but most people end up discovering that what they thought read somehow made them believe something else. How does this happen in sheets? It's called the oldest trick in the book.

If the package says, "Made with Pima cotton." Does that mean all of it is Pima cotton? No, the only indicator of full containment is the 100% prior to the content listing.

The combination of thread-count (discussed in Sheets and Toilet Paper) and the type of cotton play an important role when investing in a good set of sheets.

So the moral of today's words of wisdom is to read the label and the feel the material. Make sure you understand that all labels have both Spanish and English. 

Next time on my Making the Bed series, "Poly-blends and Microfiber: Should I put this on my bed?"