MRC has recycled 15 million mattresses and foundations — and helped inspire the entire industry to focus on sustainability.
This year, Mattress Recycling Council is marking 10 successful years of managing statewide mattress recycling programs in California, Connecticut and Rhode Island. Its fourth program, in Oregon, launched at the beginning of the year.
As it marks the milestone, the nonprofit organization has much to celebrate. It has recycled 15 million mattresses and foundations. With more than 75% of a mattress able to be recycled, it has diverted more than 500 million pounds of materials from landfills.
“In early 2017, we celebrated recycling our 1 millionth mattress,” says Mike O’Donnell, MRC chief operating officer. “It was exciting. I thought, ‘We’re really doing this.’ Every year since, MRC’s programs have added another 1.5 million to the pile.”
While the recycling statistics are impressive, they represent just a portion of MRC’s impact over the past decade.
MRC has funded more than 30 research projects that have, among other things, led to advancements in used mattress processing and discoveries of new uses for used mattress components.
Along the way, MRC has honed its model, which includes educating consumers about mattress recycling, working with retailers and large-scale mattress buyers to recycle their used units, reducing illegal dumping, and setting up transportation and recycling networks. It’s a model that can be replicated in other states that, like California, Connecticut, Oregon and Rhode Island, want to create a mattress recycling program that is harmonized and supported by the industry.
More unexpectedly perhaps, MRC has also helped foster widespread industry interest in recycling, sustainability and circularity and has brought together suppliers, manufacturers and retailers to tackle those issues.
MRC’s own programs are sustainable: O’Donnell notes that a life cycle analysis of its recycling program in California conducted in 2021 found significant environmental benefits of the program, including displacement of greenhouse gases. “The LCA showed we provide more positive environmental benefits than negative environmental impacts,” O’Donnell says.
Legislative Advocacy: Shaping Effective Mattress Recycling Programs
MRC grew out of the mattress industry’s experience with flammability. After navigating the implementation of a federal open-flame mattress standard in 2007 that protected the bedding industry from dealing with a patchwork of state flammability laws, the International Sleep Products Association sought a similar approach to mattress recycling. Initially, it focused on federal legislation that would give mattress manufacturers consistency across the country, says Ryan Trainer, recently retired president of ISPA and MRC.
When federal legislation failed to gain traction and several states started considering their own bills, ISPA changed tact, arguing against unworkable legislation that would have put the funding burden on mattress manufacturers while also requiring them to take back mattresses at the end of their useful lives. Instead, the industry advocated in favor of bills that funded mattress recycling programs via a simpler process — requiring all purchasers to pay a small fee when buying a mattress or foundation in the state, Trainer says.
In a spirit of transparency, it was important to ISPA that the recycling fee be listed clearly on purchase receipts — and it was important that the industry run each state program for harmonization.
“We wanted the states to provide oversight, but we wanted to run the recycling programs because we knew we wanted to make them as efficient as possible,” Trainer says. “We also felt we could use our knowledge of mattress materials to improve the recycling process. And, as it turned out, we’re using that knowledge now, as an industry, to help make products that will be easier to recycle at the end of their useful lives.”
Alison Keane became ISPA and MRC president in summer 2024, but she had an early hand in helping ISPA navigate passage of the mattress recycling laws in California, Connecticut and Rhode Island and in creating MRC. ISPA consulted with her on both efforts. Keane is well-versed in product stewardship. She was general counsel and secretary of the American Coatings Association’s product stewardship arm, PaintCare, and later was president and CEO of the Flexible Packaging Association.
The recycling laws ISPA supported and the creation of MRC as an industry-led organization have been good “in terms of making sure that it’s a level playing field for all producers and retailers, really, for the entire supply chain,” Keane says. “MRC has been doing great work for 10 years. We’ve got a lot to celebrate.”
Proven Success: MRC’s Impact on Mattress Recycling Across States
Since its formation, MRC has grown into a “high-performing product stewardship organization, and I’d say it’s quite an accomplishment. We’re meeting all our state program goals,” O’Donnell says.
“Even though every state is different, with different needs, we have a process for administering our programs, including the systems and software that allow us to replicate our successful programs,” he adds.
That harmonization has been important as MRC launched its fourth mattress recycling program in Oregon in January. As part of that launch, the organization is “contracting with additional solid waste facilities throughout the state to build the framework of the collection network for Oregon residents, retailers and large-volume generators” O’Donnell says. “We’ll see rapid expansion in that state throughout the year.” (See story on page 31 about other states considering mattress recycling laws.)
In addition to running the recycling programs, MRC runs the Sleep Products Sustainability Program, known as SP2, which helps California mattress producers improve efficiency and reduce environmental impacts.
MRC also has a robust research effort, investing nearly $1 million annually to make mattress collection, transportation and deconstruction more efficient and to develop new uses for recycled mattress materials to create new markets for components, including polyurethane foam. Its research has been fruitful.
For instance, a recent project sponsored by MRC led Edge Global Innovation, based in Clearwater, Florida, to convert post-consumer polyurethane foam into moldable elastomers through a process called vitrimerization. Potential uses include gaskets, rubber mats, rubber hoses, even phone cases, like the prototype currently enrobing O’Donnell’s own smartphone. The company has formed a new subsidiary, Vitricycle LLC, to oversee commercialization and is seeking partnerships. (You can read reports on all of MRC’s research efforts at MattressRecyclingCouncil.org/Research.)
Partnerships with bedding industry companies are important to MRC. For example, last month, the organization honored Covestro with its MRC Distinguished Service Award at the ISPA Industry Conference. Covestro, a producer of high-performance polymers with U.S. headquarters in Pittsburgh, has collaborated with MRC to improve mattress recycling, particularly polyurethane foam.
Industry Transformation: MRC’s Role in Advancing Sustainability
MRC’s recycling and research efforts have helped spur industry wide interest in sustainability and circularity and expanded ISPA’s efforts in those areas. ISPA launched an annual Sustainability Conference in 2022 for manufacturers, suppliers, retailers and others, and MRC contributes to the programming each year.
As part of its broader sustainability efforts, ISPA now has a director of sustainability, Kate Caddy, who has also worked for several years at MRC.
She explains how the two entities interact and what that has meant for sustainability industrywide: “MRC has gathered over a decade of end-of-life knowledge, providing valuable insights into mattress deconstruction and recycling,” Caddy says. “This knowledge is shared across the industry through various channels to offer a better understanding of mattress deconstruction and recycling at end of life. This has led to incorporating deconstruction and recycling considerations into product design, innovative products and unique collaborations. It’s an incredible collective effort between the two organizations to maximize the quality and durability of our products while factoring in what happens at the end of its useful life. This work continues to grow and evolve, and I know this collaboration will continue to drive meaningful progress in reducing our environmental impact and enhancing sustainability initiatives across our industry.”
Keane says sustainability now weaves through everything that ISPA does and, with MRC being its flagship effort, she would like the association to “do a better job promoting MRC, making sure not only ISPA members but policymakers, consumers and others know that MRC is part of ISPA and that it’s doing awesome work. We need to elevate the work of MRC and its success.”
Richard Diamonstein, who has been a member of MRC’s board since the organization’s founding and who has served as chair, has seen how the industry’s sustainability efforts have accelerated in the past decade.
“Sustainability is now the art of the possible and not just something on the wish list. Manufacturers are looking to build products that can be recycled more easily and talking about building sustainable products,” says Diamonstein, managing director of Paramount Sleep Co., an independent bedding producer based in Richmond, Virginia. “That’s a very positive direction for the industry, and I don’t think it would have happened if we didn’t have MRC and its programs in place.”
What’s Next for Mattress Recycling in the States
Both Mike O’Donnell, Mattress Recycling Council chief operating officer, and Ryan Trainer, recently retired MRC and International Sleep Products Association president, say that when MRC launched in 2015, they expected it would be operating in more states by now.
But, O’Donnell says, political uncertainty over the past decade and the Covid-19 pandemic slowed momentum in terms of states passing mattress recycling laws. Momentum has picked up during the 2025 legislative session, with multiple states considering mattress recycling bills.
ISPA and MRC President Alison Keane has a passion for advocacy and is leading the organizations’ efforts to work with legislators and regulators to craft bills that would allow MRC to run the programs using the same successful model it has in California, Connecticut, Rhode Island and now Oregon.
“If states want us and they want a good, successful program, we want to work with them,” Keane says.
So far in 2025, five states have considered mattress recycling legislation. There is a bill in Massachusetts, as well as a study bill in Virginia, that Keane says ISPA supports. On the other hand, the industry is opposing a bill in New York that Keane says would be expensive and unworkable under MRC’s model. A bill in Washington state recently died. A bill in Maryland, which MRC officials say has “flawed language,” is not expected to pass this year. New Jersey may introduce a mattress recycling bill soon.
Read more on sustainability efforts in the sleep products industry.
