How to get rid of a mattress in Carol Stream, 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.

• Carol Stream's code answers the rules question precisely. Section 9-1-7, Placement of Containers, reads: "All containers for recycling, garbage and refuse shall be placed by residents at the curb line of the premises served not earlier than 6:00 p.m. on the day before the scheduled collection, and shall be removed on or before midnight of the day on which the collection is made." It goes further than most codes by pricing the first offense: an officer who observes a violation "may issue a 'hang-on ticket'... pursuant to which the person cited may pay the sum of $25 within the time stated on the ticket as a compromise or settlement to avoid the prosecution of an ordinance violation in the Circuit Court." Section 9-1-8 makes it "unlawful to throw or deposit garbage, refuse and yard waste on any public or private property within the village, including retention/detention basins and creeks, whether occupied or unoccupied". Section 9-1-15 sets the penalty for the whole chapter: "a fine of not less than $200 or more than $750 for each separate offense", with each day after notice a separate offense, and the court may add conditional discharge or supervision of up to six months, restitution, community service or an education program. Section 9-1-6 caps a container at 30 gallons unless it is a hauler-supplied cart designed for hydraulic lifting, in which case 90 gallons. Article 1.1 makes the franchise exclusive: section 9-1.1-3 says "No person, firm or corporation shall provide garbage, refuse, recyclables or yard waste collection or removal services from single-family detached or attached residences or from multiple-family residential complexes without first acquiring a franchise from the village", and "No property owner shall enter into a contract or otherwise permit a solid waste collector without a franchise to provide collection or removal services for property within the village." The Article 1.1 definition of REFUSE expressly includes "wood furniture, bedding", so a mattress is refuse under the code, not something outside the collection system. Source Not confirmed: The code sets no wrapping or bagging requirement for a mattress, and no separate apartment or HOA rule beyond requiring every residential complex to use a franchised collector.
• Not an option: There is no public drop-off in DuPage County that a Carol Stream resident can take a mattress to, so the $6.00 curbside bulk charge is the whole answer. The County's own recycling page divides its work into "curbside and non-curbside (drop-off) recycling" and the programs it runs are electronics recycling at municipal and township sites, clothing and textile recycling partnerships, the Naperville Household Hazardous Waste facility and paint recycling. Furniture and mattresses appear nowhere on it. For anything outside the curbside cart the County points residents to its Recycle Coach tool - "Recycle Coach has been developed for non-curbside recycling drop-offs. The online guide provides a search field based on the type of material." The Village's own page sends residents to the same county guide for "hazardous waste, electronics, and other unaccounted for waste". No county-run transfer station or convenience center accepts household mattresses. Source
• Not an option: The Habitat ReStore that covers Carol Stream - DuPage and Chicago South Suburbs Habitat for Humanity, donation doors at 858 Rte 59, Naperville, IL 60540, Tuesday through Saturday 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., with a second store at 15441 S Cicero, Oak Forest - will not take a mattress. Its donate page accepts furniture broadly, listing "Bookshelves, buffets/sideboards, tables, nightstands, chairs, sofas" and bed frames, but its refusal list is explicit: "Items we cannot accept: Cribs; Textiles (clothing, curtains, bedding, linens); Used ladders; Mattresses", along with hazardous chemicals and broken items. A Carol Stream resident hoping to donate a usable mattress locally has no Habitat route; the bed frame can go, the mattress cannot. Source
• Not an option: There is nothing mattress-specific for a Carol Stream household. Illinois runs no statewide mattress recycling program and is not a Mattress Recycling Council state, so there is no Bye Bye Mattress collection site anywhere in DuPage County. The one named mattress recycler that markets into this area, LRP Recycling, sells only to organizations: its Illinois page is headed "Nationwide Commercial Recycling and Installation for Mattresses, Furniture and Electronics" and aims the service at "Schools, Hotels, Municipalities and the Military". It lists Naperville and Aurora among the Illinois communities it serves but gives no Illinois address - the only address on the page is its head office at 84 October Hill Road Suite 1, Holliston, MA 01746 - publishes no prices, states no household terms and no drop-off, and notes only that "we do not accept wet or moldy mattresses". It therefore fails the published-terms test for a household referral. Source

• 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