How to get rid of a mattress in Berwyn, IL.

Companies that come to your home and carry the mattress out, so you need no vehicle. The prices below are starting prices unless stated — stairs, box springs and extra items add to them.

Most charities will not take a used mattress. These are the ones we checked, including the ones that say no.

• The Salvation Army (satruck.org): accepted-items list includes 'Mattresses' and beds; also says local ordinances and need vary by location and to call 1-800-SA-TRUCK to confirm what a local center accepts. Source
• Doesn’t take mattresses. Habitat for Humanity national ReStore guide: 'Mattresses and box springs are not accepted.' Source

Policies vary by branch. Call before you carry one over — we asked each of the big three directly: Goodwill, the Salvation Army and Habitat for Humanity.

What we established about this city in particular — including where it runs nothing of its own and residents have to look elsewhere.

• Two further sections of Berwyn's Chapter 1060 decide who may touch a mattress set out in the alley and who pays for the service. Section 1060.07(A) states: "No scavenger, collector or any other person, other than the designated and authorized private collector or disposal contractor, shall collect or remove the contents of, or disturb, any receptacles for any class of waste defined in section 1060.01 or provided for by this chapter" - picking over a neighbor's alley set-out is an ordinance violation in Berwyn. Section 1060.05 explains the billing: "(B) All garbage, refuse, landscape (yard) waste and recyclable materials collection charges for noncommercial residences within the city shall be billed by the designated authorized garbage disposal contractor or private scavenger service and shall be paid by the occupant, owner or owner's agent. The basic charge shall entitle each family or occupant to a weekly collection of all household waste, including garbage, refuse and rubbish, all landscape (yard) waste and shrub trimmings and all recyclable materials." Charges are "assessed and billed on a quarterly basis, based upon a per unit charge that Council shall assess from time to time per negotiated contract with the private collector or disposal contractor", responsibility for payment rests with the owner, non-payment is declared a nuisance, and a 10% penalty is added to bills not paid in time. Section 1060.12 lets the contractor terminate service for delinquency and lets the Director of Public Works remove the waste and lien the property if that becomes a health hazard. Source Not confirmed: The ordinance leaves the per-unit quarterly charge to the Council's negotiated contract and does not state the current dollar amount, and neither the City nor SBC publishes it.
• Berwyn's dumping and storage rule sits in section 1490.11 of the Code of Ordinances, amended as recently as Ordinance 25-13 of August 12, 2025. It provides: "(A) All garbage or other refuse in the city shall be placed and stored, until collected by a scavenger service or city refuse contractor, in covered containers of a type prescribed by the Building Director. (B) No person shall place, leave, dump or permit to accumulate any garbage, rubbish, dead animal, vegetable waste or animal matter of any kind or trash in or on any building or premises, land or waterway in the city, so that the same may afford food or harborage for rats. (C) No person shall permit the accumulation, on any premises, improved or vacant, or on open lots and alleys in the city, any lumber, box, barrel, brick, stone or similar material that may be permitted to remain thereon, unless the same is placed on open racks that are elevated not less than 18 inches above the ground". A mattress left out in a Berwyn alley outside the weekly bulk set-out window falls within (B) and (C). The chapter carries no penalty of its own: section 1490.99, like section 1060.99 in the refuse chapter, says only "See section 202.99 for general code penalty if no specific penalty is provided." The same ordinance also now requires owners of multi-residential buildings of five or more units to file an annual rodent abatement contract with the Building Department. Source Not confirmed: Both the refuse chapter and the rat-control chapter defer to the general penalty at section 202.99, and the dollar range of that general penalty was not read.
• Not an option: Berwyn belongs to the West Cook County Solid Waste Agency - its own refuse ordinance carries an editor's note that Ordinance 89-18, passed May 23, 1989, "authorized participation in the West Cook County Solid Waste Agency" - but the agency runs nothing a resident could take a mattress to. The agency's own site describes it as formed in 1989 to plan "for the responsible management of solid waste in west Cook County" and to provide "recycling and waste disposal programs and technical assistance" to its 36 member communities, and the programs it actually lists are electronics recycling, paint (which residents are told to dry out with kitty litter, shredded paper or sand), household chemicals collections that send material "to IEPA approved recycling and reuse facilities", and medication disposal. There is no agency-run transfer station, no permanent drop-off site and no mention of mattresses, furniture or bulky waste anywhere on it. Neither the City of Berwyn nor the agency publishes a self-haul site for a mattress, which is consistent with the City's answer being curbside: the free weekly bulk item. Source Not confirmed: Neither Berwyn nor the West Cook County Solid Waste Agency names any transfer station or landfill where a resident may self-haul a mattress, or publishes a gate price for one.
• Not an option: Habitat for Humanity Chicago's ReStore, the nearest Habitat resale store to Berwyn, refuses mattresses outright. Its donation page states: "The main items we DO NOT accept are: Clothing | Mattresses | Televisions | Used Doors & Windows | Paint | Sleeper Sofas | China Cabinets". A Berwyn resident with a usable mattress cannot donate it there; the free weekly bulk collection remains the route. Source Not confirmed: The refusal names mattresses but is silent on box springs and bed frames.

• Residential body says Saturday 8–2; same-page footer says 9–1. Both show weekdays 8–4. No Saturday schedule selected. Source
• Locator retains Landfill 33 Saturday 7 a.m.–11 p.m. exactly as printed; implausible closing time requires confirmation. Two Columbus District Office cards are distinct OH and IN addresses, not duplicates. Source
• Illinois EPA recycling page offers a 'Beyond The Bin' ArcGIS map of recycling locations, an Earth911 ZIP locator and the Recycle Coach app (statewide partnership since 2025). No mattress stewardship program mentioned. No statewide mattress stewardship program or landfill ban found on Illinois EPA pages as of 2026-09-22; mattress disposal is handled by local governments. Source
• There is no state mattress recycling program in Illinois, and the absence is worth stating plainly because the four states that have one give residents free drop-off. The Mattress Recycling Council, which runs the Bye Bye Mattress collection network, lists its programs on its own Programs page as operating in California, Connecticut, Oregon and Rhode Island. Illinois is not among them. Three things follow for an Illinois resident: no recycling fee is charged on an Illinois mattress sale, there is no MRC-funded free drop-off anywhere in the state, and nothing obliges a retailer, hauler or municipality to recycle a mattress rather than landfill it. Recycling in Illinois is therefore a private arrangement wherever it exists at all — the drop-offs and recyclers listed on this page are businesses and charities choosing to do it, not a program a resident is entitled to. Source