This is the page where I talk you out of paying me, at least half the time. A mattress is one of the very few bulky things in Sacramento that is genuinely free to get rid of, by three separate routes. What is not free is carrying a king down a turning staircase and fitting it into a car that was never going to take it.
California funds mattress recycling through a fee you already paid at the till when you bought it, so the disposal end is covered before you start. In Sacramento that cashes out as three options: drop it at a participating recycler yourself, put it in one of your two free city junk pickups, or take it to Kiefer, where mattresses carry no fee on a non-business load. All three cost nothing. They differ only in how much lifting and driving they ask of you, which is the whole subject of this page.
The Sacramento Recycling and Transfer Station at 8491 Fruitridge Road takes up to five mattresses or box springs per vehicle, Monday to Saturday 8 to 5, on (916) 737-4870. Imperial Mattress S.P.M. at 3440 La Grande Boulevard takes them free as well, Monday to Friday 7 to 3:30, on (916) 394-2828. Both list business loads as accepted, which is worth a phone call to confirm if you are a landlord or a property manager, since most free mattress programmes are households only. Further out the same state scheme covers Western Placer at 3195 Athens Avenue in Lincoln, capped at four per household and residents only, and El Dorado Disposal at 4100 Throwita Way in Placerville for county residents.
Mattresses and box springs are on the accepted list for the City of Sacramento's free household junk appointment — two a calendar year, February through October, booked on the Sac311 app, at sac311.org, or on 311. The rule people fall foul of is the 24 hour one: a mattress at the kerb more than a day before the appointment counts as illegal dumping and attracts a fine. A mattress is also a conspicuous thing to be fined for, since it is visible from the end of the street. The rest of the allowance and its limits are set out on my Sacramento junk removal page.
Mattresses carry no disposal fee at Kiefer Landfill on non-business loads, 12701 Kiefer Boulevard in Sloughhouse. The catch is the gate itself: a pickup truck pays $35 as a non-weighed load before anything in the back is even considered, and Sloughhouse is a long way east of midtown. If you were already driving out there with other material, add the mattress and it costs you nothing extra. If the mattress is the only reason for the trip, Fruitridge Road is far closer and charges nothing at all.
Because not one of the free routes carries it down the stairs. A king mattress is not especially heavy; it is unmanageable. It folds in the middle exactly where you do not want it to, catches on banisters, and will not go into a sedan however determined you are. Add a box spring, which does not bend at all and will not turn a tight landing, and what should be a twenty minute job becomes an afternoon and some damage to the paintwork. I bring the vehicle and the second pair of hands, which is the entire service.
Recyclers set their own condition rules and the Sacramento sites do not publish theirs, so ring ahead before you drive over with something that has been rained on or stored in a damp garage. If you suspect bed bugs, do not drag it through the house: seal it in sheeting or a mattress bag in the room it is already in, then move it. That protects the rest of the house, and it is what any facility will expect to see. Say so on the phone when you call me — it changes how I handle it, not whether I will.
Priced on the space the load fills, by the cubic yard, with a $165 minimum on any trip. One mattress on its own is the worst value anywhere on this website and I would rather write that here than say it on your doorstep. Where the number starts making sense is when the mattress is part of something larger: a whole bedroom, a tenant's leftovers, three beds out of a rental turnover, a house move where the bed is one of fifteen things going. Once the vehicle is already at your address, the second mattress adds very little.
The city runs one free disposal morning a year at 8491 Fruitridge Road. The 2026 event ran on 6 June and the next date is announced in spring. It caps mattresses at four and box springs at four per vehicle, and you have to arrive in a car, truck, van or SUV — trailers and U-Hauls are turned away at the gate, which catches out people who hired a van specifically for the trip. For most of the year it is not an option, which is why the two drop-off sites above matter more.
Bed frames, headboards, bed bases, closets and chests of drawers — the rest of the bedroom, in other words — plus the usual furniture, appliances, televisions and computers, garage clutter and yard waste. Nothing has to be at the kerb beforehand. The single exclusion is hazardous material: paint, solvents, fuel, pool chemicals. Those go to a county hazardous waste counter instead, free, 15 gallons or 125 pounds per visit, one visit a month.
One mattress, a pickup truck in the driveway and a free weekday morning: drive it to Fruitridge Road and keep your money. Five fit in one vehicle there, so a whole household's worth goes in a single run. If there is no truck but you can wait for a date between February and October, the free city pickup takes it and costs nothing either. The honest answer is that I am worth calling when there are several, when it is upstairs, when the staircase turns, or when it has to be gone by a particular morning.
Compiled 17 October 2026 from the Mattress Recycling Council's participating facility listings for the Sacramento region, the City of Sacramento's 2026-27 service guide and free disposal day notice, Sacramento County's household hazardous waste drop-off brochure, and the Kiefer Landfill fee schedule effective 1 January 2026. Fees, hours and accepted materials change. Call ahead before you load a vehicle, and tell me if anything here has gone out of date.
Tell me which floor it is on and whether the stairs turn. That, and a Sacramento address, is enough to price it and book a morning.
