How to get rid of a mattress in Collegedale, TN.

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.

• Collegedale collects all three streams with its own crews and its own trucks, which is why the large trash route exists at all, and the weekly can is sealed tight against anything oversized. The Sanitation Schedule page states that "Services include weekly garbage collection, monthly brush collection, and monthly large trash collection", that the city provides the service with automated garbage trucks, and that "Garbage carts MUST be placed at the street by 6:30 am and be removed from the street by the end of the day." The weekly route is narrow by design: "The weekly pickup is for household garbage only." with "No brush, yard waste, building materials or hazardous waste except for sharps", "All garbage MUST be placed inside the city container for pickup", "The city will not pick up garbage out side of the provided container", "Garbage cart lids MUST be closed entirely and nothing protruding out of the container" and "All trash should be bagged." Building materials are spelled out as "wood, metal, paint, sheetrock, tile, roofing shingles, etc." A second cart is available: "One additional garbage cart per household is allowed for a one-time fee of $95." Because a lid that must close entirely rules out anything the size of a mattress, the monthly large trash route is not a convenience in Collegedale but the only city route a mattress has. The Public Works FAQ confirms the monthly shape of it, directs residents to the published schedule or City Hall at (423) 396-3135, says a holiday normally pushes garbage to "the following Wednesday", and for brush says "Public Works will pick up the equivalent of one pickup truck load" with trimmings no more than ten feet long and nine inches in diameter, professional tree services removing their own. Source Not confirmed: The monthly collection dates are published as a separate linked list that was not read, so the specific large trash week for a given street is not recorded. Not confirmed: No monthly or annual residential solid waste rate is published on the pages read.

• No statewide mattress stewardship program or landfill ban found on TDEC pages as of 2026-09-22; mattress disposal is handled by local governments. Source
• TDEC Materials Management page links a 'Where may I dispose of recycle items near me?' ArcGIS dashboard (arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/f7515b25ca29478a8adc6a9dc8c1f7c1); program supports 95 counties and solid waste planning regions. Source
• The ArcGIS dashboard TDEC links from its Materials Management page is titled "County Recycling Centers". Its correct address is arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/f7515b25ca29478a8adc6a9dc8c1f7c1 — this corrects the partially recorded id in st-tn-102 (the id f7515b25ca29478a8a1b9bd68a4bba51 returns "item cannot be found"). It is the statewide map residents use to find county recycling centers. Source
• TDEC's Waste Management Branch page lists the state's full set of solid waste programs — Solid Waste, Landfill Operators Certification, waste tire hauler, hazardous and medical waste, and Materials Management (Recovered Materials, grants, HHW, waste tires, organics, debris management, BOPAE household batteries/oil/paint/antifreeze/electronics). No mattress program, bulky-waste rule or disposal ban appears. The page also links the Solid Waste Dataviewer (dataviewers.tdec.tn.gov/dataviewers/f?p=19035:34001), which searches facility information, inspection reports, complaints and forms. It notes that, effective August 1, Materials Management moves into TDEC's Division of Stakeholder Engagement with programs and services continuing unchanged. Source
• Mattress Recycling Council's Program States page names exactly four program states — California, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Oregon. Tennessee is not among them, confirming there is no MRC-run mattress stewardship program or Bye Bye Mattress free drop-off network in Tennessee. Source