I’m in the market for a latex bed for my son of 2.5 years.
There happens to be a store nearby - Healthy Choice Organic Mattresses (hcmattress.com) but their prices are extreme.
I’ll probably settle on using Ken at mattresses.net, but I do have one really interesting question:
How can this place get off on calling their mattresses Organic when it is clear they use ‘all natural’ latex from Latex Int, which doesn’t use certified Organic material, right? Is this deceptive or am I missing something.
You’re correct that there is no Talalay latex in the world that has an organic certification. In most cases this is marketing information and usually means that the cover is organic instead of the whole mattress or the latex layers themselves. A more accurate description would be “100% natural Talalay latex mattress with an organic cover” but the word “organic” is so commonly misused in the entire industry that some retailers or manufacturers believe they need to use “organic” for competitive reasons instead of it’s more technically correct meaning … and with the current state of the market and consumer misunderstanding of what organic really means when it comes to mattresses … to some degree they may have legitimate concerns.
There are three levels of organic certifications (see post #2 here for more specifics about certifications).
First are the raw materials and if this is an agricultural crop then it can be USDA certified as a raw material.
Second is the actual component or layer itself which is made from organic raw materials. In this case it would be GOTS certified if it was a fabric or GOLS certified if it was latex. These can be called “organic” but not USDA certified organic. There is more about organic latex and other types and blends of latex in post #6 here.
Finally there is the certification for the complete production chain from raw materials to the final mattress itself to make sure that every step meets the organic guidelines (see here). This would technically be the only mattress that can legitimately be called an organic mattress vs a mattress that includes all organic materials but this isn’t the normal “practice” in the industry.
Other than this you would have a mattress that “contained” organic components or materials but the mattress itself wouldn’t be organic … as a final product.
To my knowledge there are currently only 3 manufacturers that have organic mattresses vs mattresses made with all organic materials and components or mattresses that included organic materials or components and these are Naturepedic (see here and here), OMI (see here and here) and Savvy Rest (wool mattress … see here). NOTE ADDED: Soaring Heart also certified their factory in Jan, 2015 so they also make latex mattresses that are certified organic “as a mattress” as well.
While of course many people look for organic certifications to make sure there are no chemicals used in the production or manufacturing of any wool or cotton in a mattress for “safety” reasons more than because of the actual farming methods that are used for the agricultural crop (cotton especially uses more pesticides in it’s production than any other agricultural crop so it may be important to make sure it’s organic or at least pesticide and chemical free), I would also be aware that there are some very high quality and “non chemical” wools available that aren’t certified organic but use organic farming and production methods even though they don’t certify their wool because of the additional costs it would add to their wool. If the wool was from this type of source (such as eco wool), then an organic certification may not be as important but of course this is always a personal preference issue and for some people an organic certification may be important for personal or lifestyle or environmental reasons or other other reasons besides the actual quality or performance of the materials themselves in spite of the additional costs that may be involved (see post #3 here)
Post #2 here and the posts it links to also have more information about “organic”, “natural”, “safe”, and “green” mattresses and materials for those whose main criteria is the safety of the materials in their mattress rather than an organic certification that may be helpful for those that are trying to answer the often frustrating and confusing question “how safe is safe enough for me?”.
I think you still have to realize no mattress will be 100% organic. Innersprings are made from metal which are not organic. WIth Naturepedic if it is the one that has the plastic side that would not be organic. Even OMI uses some Talalay latex in some beds which have no certifications.