Questions may be edited for length and clarity. We need a new mattress for our second bedroom, and my boyfriend wants to buy a used one off Craigslist. Is this icky or eco? Or so I would have said, before I actually began researching what happens to old mattresses when they die; what I uncovered, however, is way ickier: Twenty million mattresses, heaved into the trash every year. That's in the United States alone. Here, all those springs and stuffing amount to over 450 million cubic feet of landfill space. Lay out those mattresses end to end though, and they would stretch out over 25,000 miles -- enough to circumnavigate the globe. If picturing a ring of Posturepedics around the planet isn't enough to make you shudder, then maybe carcinogenic contamination will: Conventional mattresses contain toxic chemicals like flame retardants, formaldehyde, and phthalates, which can leach from the landfill into our drinking water. Then there's the possibility of polluting our air with even more of these chemicals, since difficult-to-compress mattresses create flammable air pockets that can increase the risk of landfill fires.
And let's not forget about the sheer danger, too, for sanitation workers who regularly have to remove these bulky items manually from heavy machinery when the springs and coils get caught. So maybe your boyfriend's impulse to save a mattress from a landfill death isn't so loathsome, after all? As a friend who works in the hospitality industry recently pointed out, anyone who's ever stayed a night in a hotel (whether it's a Holiday Inn or the Four Seasons) has shared a bed with thousands of others before him. What's the big deal about sleeping on a mattress that had one previous owner? Simply put: bed bugs. The age-old childhood bedtime caution, "Don't let the bed bugs bite!" has now become a nationwide epidemic; infestations of the blood-sucking pests have become so widespread that the Environmental Protection Agency has gotten involved. (It hosted its Second National Bed Bug Summit this past February.) While bed bugs aren't known to spread disease, they can plague those afflicted with intensely itchy bites and the bloodstained fecal mess they leave in their wake.
Because they're so insidious -- surviving up to 18 months in the tiny cracks of wood furniture without so much as a morsel -- many eradication experts recommend steering clear of secondhand furniture like upholstered chairs and wood dressers altogether, let alone used mattresses and box springs. If you have a high squeamish factor and still wish to buy pre-owned, examine the mattress carefully for the telltale signs of infestation, and place it in a protective encasement before you bring it into your home. (Beware, by the way, those "new" mattresses that are advertised on Craigslist. According to green living expert Danny Seo, those may be old curbside mattresses masquerading as new, thanks to the addition of a fresh fabric cover and a layer of shrink wrap.) But I say the risk of buying a used mattress isn't worth it. If you do wind up with bed bugs and they spread to your other belongings, you'll be sending more stuff to the landfill than just your mattress. Then, too, there are the chemicals that may have to be used in your home by a professional pest management company to eradicate the insects.
(DIY pest control isn't recommended, since it can make bed bugs spread.) Is there a trusted friend or family member who could hand down a mattress instead? Your best option: Invest in a high-quality mattress made from natural and biodegradable materials. One company, Essentia, makes its petroleum- and VOC-free memory foam mattresses from natural latex, a renewable resource that comes from the rubber tree plant. Shepherd's Dream wool mattresses are designed to last decades, and can even be sent back to the company for refurbishing. Not surprisingly, these come with a higher-than-average price tag. But when you consider that a conventional spring mattress needs to be replaced every five to seven years, you may decide that the long-term investment (for you and the planet) is worth it. Of course, we can't close a conversation about buying a new (or new-used) mattress without discussing what to do with your old one. You wouldn't know it, based on how many of them are kicked to the curb, but old mattresses can, in fact, be recycled.
or this list here you can't find a recycling facility near you, donate the mattress to someone who really needs it, via The Salvation Army or Freecycle. Just make sure your offering is free of bed bugs; no one wants to reuse a batch of those.What It Is, Why It Works, And The 5 Key Things To Look For When Buying A Memory Foam Bed Or Topper. While memory foam was developed for NASA in the 1970's, it didn't hit the consumer market until the early 1990's - first as memory foam mattress topper pads, and later used in memory foam mattresses. Since then, memory foam mattresses have become the fastest growing segment in the mattress industry. With every year, you see more and more companies selling memory foam mattresses and topper pads, and it is very difficult, even for those of us in the industry, to keep up with all the new memory foam products being introduced. What is a consumer to do? 1. Brief History Of Memory Foam And Why Not All Memory Foam Created Equal - Some Just More Comfortable And Sleeps Cooler Than Others
2. How To Choose Between Different Memory Foams 3. What To Look For In A Memory Foam Mattress Or Topper, And When You Might Need To Get A New Mattress In this guide, I'm going to do my best to give you the straight story on what memory foam is, how it works, and what to look for in memory foam (density and quality, memory foam toppers versus memory foam mattresses, etc.). Armed with the information, I hope you are able to find just the right memory foam mattress, topper pad, or other product that fits your needs. Where the mattress industry so often sells on hype about latest greatest technology, I wanted to concentrate on actual, verifiable information when putting together this guide. So before we go into the details about memory foam, I thought it was important to first look at the bottom line -- how does memory foam compare to standard innerspring mattresses for comfort. And what is great about the internet is that these days you can cut through the hype to see the actual data on this -- real reviews, by real folks, trying out the mattresses in their own homes.
And while it was hard to get this kind of objective information back in '94 when I was first starting out selling memory foam after it helped me with my back pain, in 2014 all this information is now at your fingertips, literally. While comfort is subjective, what is no longer subjective is that certain types of mattress are just more comfortable than others. And you don't have to take my word for it, or any other mattress retailer. The numbers don't lie. Based on over 22,000 real people's mattress experiences, the meta site Sleep Like the Dead found that in analyzing this information that memory foam mattresses received the highest level of customer satisfaction of any mattress type at 81%. In contrast, only 64% of innerspring owners said they were satisfied. That is a huge difference, and shows the simple reason why memory foam has gained such popularity -- it delivers comfort in a way that far surpasses the standard innerspring mattress. Where did memory foam come from and what gives memory foam its unique comfort properties?