Attracting and retaining the right people. Cutting costs. Managing cash. Raising capital.

All played a role in turning around Select Comfort Corp., a developer, manufacturer and marketer of adjustable-firmness beds, said CEO Bill McLaughlin. But strategic marketing has been the most critical element that has helped the Plymouth-based firm grow top-line revenue and awaken from the doldrums, he told the Upper Midwest chapter of the Turnaround Management Association last week in Minneapolis.

Select Comfort is so confident in its strategy that it will increase annual marketing expenditures to $50 billion by next year from $30 million last year-- more dollars but a smaller percentage of sales, McLaughlin said.

Shortly after joining the company three years ago, McLaughlin crystallized his ideas for fixing several years of declining sales, rising expenses and dwindling cash.

"We had to broaden our focus from back-pain relief to sleep," McLaughlin told the TMA. "We had the only bed that was clinically proven to help people sleep better."

McLaughlin determined Select Comfort needed to promote the product feature consumers love: the ability to digitally select personal preferences; appeal to all ages, not just the previously targeted 55-to-65 age group; and direct consumers to 300-plus Select Comfort stores.

Given McLaughlin's early assessment, a marketing employee advised the CEO to dust off a previously shelved advertising program, and so the "Sleep Number" campaign was born in 2000.

"Everybody has a Sleep Number. It's your key to a perfect night's sleep," McLaughlin said. "You can only find it on a Sleep Number bed, which you can only find in a Sleep Number store. And we're going to tell you exactly where it is."

More than advertising, the Sleep Number campaign has been "a complete repositioning and rebranding of the product," McLaughlin said. It extends to public relations, store design, product names and sales strategies.

The approach has worked, if soaring revenue and profits, a flush bank account with virtually no debt, and a climbing stock price are any indication. And the expanding marketing budget indicates that Select Comfort doesn't plan to rest on its laurels.

Celebrities take a Sleep Number

Minnesota Timberwolves star Kevin Garnett, radio announcer Paul Harvey, and TV's "Bionic Woman," Lindsay Wagner, might make strange bedfellows. But all are ambassadors for Select Comfort.

Wagner recently was in Minneapolis shooting commercials for Sleep Number beds, McLaughlin said. Paul Harvey has been a longtime pitchman for the beds, bringing "high credibility" with older age groups, he said.

And Kevin Garnett? We haven't seen him selling mattresses on the airwaves. But, the 6-foot-11-inch, 220-pound forward knows his Sleep Number, McLaughlin said.

"Kevin Garnett needed a bed, so we made a bed for him and saw that we could do that pretty easily for big and tall people," he said.

Credit Garnett with helping Select Comfort develop a new niche market.