TikTok riveted by one of Pa.’s last waterbed stores

What is believed to be the oldest surviving photo in the U.S. was taken in Pennsylvania. Can you guess which city?

Hint: It's also home to the first selfie.

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“Do you know what I was thinking about?” TikTok user @_acid_g_ asked in an Oct. 9 video. “What happened to all the waterbeds in the world?”

Tara Clark wondered the same thing when she came across the video and recalled the waterbed she purchased from a store near Pittsburgh in 1998. 

Clark, a Greensburg resident, told PA Local she owned the bed for four years. 

“That was my first big purchase,” she said. “I got the lowest-end [model]. It was definitely warm and comfy. Best night’s sleep of my life.”

After watching the TikTok, Clark decided to Google the store — Alternative Bedding — to see if it still exists. 

It does, and that same TikTok reached the owner of the Brentwood, Allegheny County business through his son, who used it to achieve a level of notoriety most waterbed dealers aren’t seeing these days. 

The serendipity was something of a wish come true.

Owner Ronald Feitl had for years asked his YouTuber son to make a video advertising the store to let people know waterbeds still exist. But his son, Brent, aka BrentTV, wanted the recognition to happen organically. The content creator is known for his YouTube series on collectible toys, games, and popsicles.

“The problem is just making a video saying, ‘Hey everyone, I'm at my dad's store. He sells waterbeds.’ It's boring. It won't work. I know my audience. They're kids,” Brent told Spotlight PA. 

He sat on the idea until he saw that fateful TikTok. 

"I was like ‘Omg, yes, this is perfect.’ This guy is posing a question, has over a million views, and has comments asking what happened,” he recalled.

The next morning Brent went to his dad’s store to record a response video telling everyone about “one of the last waterbed stores in America.” The video, watchable here, gained traction overnight, racking up millions of views and more than 834,000 likes and 7,000 comments as of Nov. 2. 

“It's really cool because people have been calling the store expressing interest,” Brent said. “Some people have visited because they want to try out the bed for the first time.”

Waterbeds have been a part of Ronald Feitl’s life for a long time. He got his first one when he was 15. Then his brother opened a waterbed store in Brentwood called World of Waterbeds in 1975. After working at his brother’s business for years, Feitl opened Alternative Bedding in 1992. 

“I opened this business after the boom,” Feitl added.

Waterbeds became a hot commodity in the 70s, raking in $13 million domestically for their unique sleeping experience in 1971. The invention was popular at the time for its association with sex. Some brands would use slogans like: "Live and love in liquid luxury.” The waterbed industry reached its peak in the 80s, becoming a $2 billion business by 1984, Mental Floss reports. They made up 22% of all mattress sales in the U.S. by 1987. But that share would plummet to 5% by 2013. 

Pittsburgh was once a competitive market for the liquid-filled furniture. Feitl said there were over 10 stores with multiple chains in the city. He remembers one store being right across the street from his. Now, there are a few mattress shops that may have a waterbed for sale, but Feitl’s is one of the last dedicated brick-and-mortar stores in Pennsylvania and the nation as a whole.

(Feitl said customers have come to his store from out of state because their cities don’t have one. A few days ago, he said, a group visited from Buffalo, New York, more than three hours away.)

“This is like the last Blockbuster,” one commenter wrote below Brent’s TikTok tribute to his dad’s shop, prompting Brent to create Blockbuster logo-inspired stickers in the shape of Pennsylvania reading: “I visited the last waterbed store in Pittsburgh.”

Brent added: “[TikTok viewers] are probably not going to buy a waterbed, but if they want to check out the store, you can afford a sticker for $1. I thought it would be fun to have a gimmick.”

Waterbeds themselves were long derided as exactly that, a gimmick, but Feitl said the industry hit a decline for several reasons, including price wars. He remembers waterbeds being priced as low as $99 for any size. They were also relatively difficult to move.

Tara Clark of Greensburg avoided that complicated task by selling her waterbed to the person who bought her apartment. She’s currently trying to convince her husband to get a new one. 

Clark recently visited Feitl’s shop and posted about it on Facebook, even sharing pictures of her lying on her waterbed from the 90s. 

Feitl is happy to see new customers, return customers — any customers, really: “It’s nice to see new interest in all ages in the waterbed. A lot of younger people have never seen them and want them as well. We have opened up to a lot of folks who really weren't coming in.”

—Tanisha Thomas, newsletter writer / reporter

“People don’t think of Pennsylvania and country music, but it’s big here. Real big. I’ve had thousands of people come here to listen to country music, to see country’s biggest stars, right across the street.”

—Pat Garrett of Pennsylvania, who supplied sheepskin jackets to the cast of Yellowstone and once performed onstage with Taylor Swift

The oldest surviving photo in the U.S. was believed to have been taken in Philadelphia, Billy Penn reports.

Western Pennsylvania native Joseph Saxton took a photo of the Philadelphia Central High School and the Pennsylvania State Arsenal in 1839. He used a cigar box and glass lens to produce a daguerreotype image. Saxton was working at the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia at the time.

Weeks after his snap, Robert Cornelius posed for a photo alone in the yard of his family’s Philadelphia gas lighting business. The result — made with a similar makeshift camera — is considered the first selfie ever taken. 

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