36: What’s Really Lurking in Your Mattress?

Narrator

How would you like to improve your health and keep your family safe? You're listening to the healthy home hacks podcast where we firmly believe enjoying optimal health shouldn't be a luxury healthy home authorities and husband and wife team Ron and Lisa will help you create a home environment that will level up your health. It's time to hear from the experts. listen in on honest conversations and gain the best tips and advice. If you're ready to dive in and improve your well-being and increase your energy, you're in the right place. All right, here are your hosts, Val biologists, authors, media darlings, vicarious vegans and avocado aficionados, Ron and Lisa Beres.

Ron Beres

Hi, friends and welcome to today's show. This is part two of going under cover literally, and taking a deep dive into what's really lurking and your conventional mattress, and today's show is going to be on fire. As we delve into the heated topic of flame retardants.

Lisa Beres

Yes, and I'd like to kick off today's show with one of my favorite Walt Whitman quotes. �Now I see the secret of making the best person it is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.� sounds beautiful right? But so many of us are so far removed from eating and sleeping with the earth in today's toxic world.

Ron Beres

That's right, Lisa, you know In fact, according to the detox your sleep study by made safe most mattresses are made of polyurethane foam, which is treated with flame retardants linked to endocrine disruption, lowered IQ, hyperactivity, altered sexual development, fertility issues, thyroid dysfunction, and even cancer because polyurethane foam is highly flammable. They have to add flame retardant chemicals to meet the mattress flammability standard, whereas when you have natural materials like wool and cotton, that are generally less flammable, they don't require that extra flame retardant.

Lisa Beres

Someone who has a whopping seven post nominal titles after his name, and four decades of experience investigating and assessing hazardous materials, and contamination, resolving environmental problems and protecting human health, safety and the environment is our special guest today. Barry a Cik Berry is the founder and technical director of Naturepedic, a manufacturer of award winning certified organic mattresses. He has had a lifelong interest in preserving the environment, not only for us, but for all future generations as well.

Ron Beres

A Board-Certified environmental engineer, Barry is an advocate for legislative reform and was invited to testify in Washington DC for congressional subcommittee exploring chemical reform. Barry is also a frequent speaker and thought leader on the benefits of sustainable product design. And when shopping for his first grandchild's crib mattress, he was troubled to discover the state of the baby mattress industry. And from that moment, Barry was inspired and he was determined to create mattress products that were safer and healthier for every child. And working in tandem with his son's very established Naturepedic in 2003.

Lisa Beres

Friends if you missed part one, head to Episode 34. Now, Barry, welcome back to the show.

Barry A. Cik

It's a pleasure to be back. The last one was great. And I just enjoy talking to you. Thank you very much.

Lisa Beres

Oh, likewise, we have so much more to cover today that we didn't even get time to last time. So, let's dive right in. Barry, if you can share with our listeners who aren't familiar, what exactly is a flame retardant?

Barry A. Cik

Okay, so in order to answer that question, let's step back for a moment and review the bigger picture. The bigger picture is that we do not live in the natural world that our grandparents lived in, in our grandparent�s time. Everything was cotton and wall and steel and wood and just not more natural kinds of things. We do not live in that world. We live in a petroleum world. That is the big picture that we all have to stop and understand. We've we live in a world where everything is made from petroleum, okay. Now, if everything is made from petroleum, petroleum is very flammable.

Petroleum is flammable as it gets. Yeah. You know on planet Earth. So how do we deal with it? And let me just say. You know, in your grandparent�s days when there was a fire, everybody just yelled and screamed, get everybody out of bed run down the steps today when there's a fire and the smoke is halfway up to the clouds, you know, people die much quicker. And you'll see on TV or reading the paper, why? It's because there's so much petroleum in your products and a mattress typical queen size mattress, you're sleeping on 20 gallons of petroleum 20. Guys, did you hear that? 20 gallons of petroleum, you just spent a couple $1,000 on 20 gallons of petroleum. That's right. So, what's a flame retardant? First of all, people say flame retardant or fire retardant. There's no difference between the two. Let's just get our vocabulary straight. Yeah, no matter whether you say fire retardant or flame, or does it mean to say that tomato doesn't matter? It's tomato, tomato. And when you say fire proof, same idea. Okay, so let's just ask a simple question here. If everything has flame retardants, and we'll talk about that in a minute, but let's assume if everything has flame retardants, why are Why are the manufacturer is putting all that in the products? Are they trying to hurt everybody? And the answer is no, of course not. Nobody's trying to hurt you. Okay, it has nothing to do with that. The problem is that if the product is made from highly flammable materials, then there's two reasons to put it in. One is because you know, better, you know, you're trying, you know that this is a highly flammable material. So, you're going to add some flame retardants to bring that flammability down. And the second reason, which is the flip side of the same coin, is that the government may require it. Now, the government is not necessarily going to require flame retardants per se. That's not how the regulations are made. Right. Government doesn't say you must put flame retardants and what the government says is, you must meet a certain standard, right? Yeah. And in order to meet that standard, if your material and your product is highly flammable, in order to meet that standard, what are you going to do? You're going to add flame retardants. So that's the reason why you finding flame retardants everywhere, because they're dealing with all this petroleum. So, we can talk about the different standards, but you understand at least a bigger picture here as to why they're clever. Yeah. Now, why would a conventional mattress company who's using a heavy amount of petroleum polyurethane foam, why wouldn't they use a natural flame retardant? Because it wouldn't be powerful enough for the amount of petroleum derived material? Or is it more expensive? Alright, so flame retardants allow the mattress to burn, it just slows it down. That's number one. Okay, they need the manufacturer needs to meet a standard. The standard doesn't say the mattress can't burn does, that's not the standard, they're adding a flame retardant just to meet a certain standard. Now to the next part of your question, why can't they use a more natural material, let's say like wool, right? That's a different reason, because they're selling the mattress for 500 bucks. Okay, price, it's a cost issue, it's a price issue. So you know, they're not, they're going to use the cheapest thing they can, and adding some adding some flame retardants, adding a bunch of chemicals is going to be a lot cheaper than using cotton or wool or, you know, material and there's a lot of material that goes into a mattress, you're not talking about a small amount of material, and then the price adds up. So that's the bottom line they're trying to meet, they're trying to meet a standard more times than not, and they try to do it as cheaply as they can. And if I may say, so, if the product whether it's a mattress or something else, if the product is made overseas somewhere, and they can save some money, trust me, they're going to save.

Lisa Beres

Okay, right. Yeah, and we talked we mentioned this on the last episode, I'm going to mention it again, listeners, you are investing in your health when you buy a healthy organic mattress like the ones from Naturepedic. These manufacturers, as we learned last episode, have to pay for these certifications, they're paying for higher quality materials that aren't going to harm you and your children, and that aren't going to last the test of time. And so that's really what it is. This is an investment in your health. And as I always say, invest in yourself now or pay a big price later because we've had family members passive cancer in the last couple years, we've seen a lot of illness in our family, I'm sure you have if you're listening, no one's immune to knowing somebody that's, you know, become sick and it's kind of a with a lot of people. It's out of sight out of mind, like oh, I'm healthy right now. I don't need to worry about that. You know, I don't even need to buy organic food but guys, this all matters. This is stuff that's going into your body into the air you breathe. And I just want to reiterate that because I don't want cost to always stop people, because you'll end up paying it later.

Ron Beres

Barry, can you explain to our listeners, what is an FR barrier,

Barry A. Cik

An FR barrier is something physical in the mattress that blocks the fire from spreading, okay, so it blocks the fire from spreading, even if it blocks it for just minutes, that might be enough to meet the government standards. So that's one of the ways that manufacturers meet a standard, there's a lot of ways to meet the standard, there are chemicals that are added to materials to try to make that material less ignitable. And then the other way is okay, the material will ignite but we're going to block it. And so that doesn't, it doesn't travel, you know, for 15 minutes, okay? Or try to block it at least partially. So, the different ways that they deal with this whole issue of flammability, and a barrier is one way to do it. Now, many manufacturers will say, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, we don't have flame retardant chemicals. We just have a plain barrier. Well, what do you think the flame barrier is? I think you're still getting flame retardant chemicals. And there are there are hundreds of flame retardant chemicals that are used right now today.

Lisa Beres

What would you say are the most common? Do you know?

Barry A. Cik

So, there are hundreds of flame retardant chemicals, but here are some that are common that we've collected. organophosphates, organophosphates, melamine phosphate, boric acid, ammonium phosphate, organic chlorine, organic bromine, antimony oxide, modacrylic melamine and these are just some ones that are that are being used today.

Lisa Beres

That's crazy. That's a that reads like a chemistry book not a mattress, right? I mean, that doesn't. You don't even have to know what those are to know. You don't really want to be sleeping on those. Yep, yep. So okay, so flame retardants are in so many consumer products today. I mean, I think a lot of people associate them with baby car seats, but might not realize that they're also in electronics or in upholstery, although I believe the legal legislation has sort of lessened on the requirements for upholstery. But why are they in so many consumer products today?

Barry A. Cik

First of all, the use of plain returns, I'm sorry to say has not less than including upholstery furniture, let's make that clear. There are regulations for mattresses than there are regulations for upholstered furnishings, which means your couch or sofa or your dining room chair that's covered with some upholstery. Okay, so let's talk about that just really quickly here. Those are separate regulations. For mattresses. There are two major flame retardant related regulations for upholstery. There used to be only one and only in California, effective this year, the federal government just took that California regulation and made it national. So, there is going to be more flame retardants on the market coming the next few months than less. Okay, we're getting the problem is getting bigger and bigger. Once again, if the material if the material is petroleum base, they're going to be they're going to be using flame retardant chemicals or flame retardants of one kind or another. Okay, and once again, there are many chemicals, there are many ways to play the game. And it's hard to say which is worse than what, because most of them I've never been tested. Okay. I can cover the basic, the basic ways that that, that these regulations work.

Lisa Beres

Isn't SB 117. Correct.

Barry A. Cik

TB 117. Yes. That's the new one. That's now nationwide. That's now nationwide, okay. Which is very, totally separate from what mat mattresses have to adhere to? Well, one of the mattress standards is similar to TB117. Okay, so they're separate standards, not exactly the same. But there's one mattress regulation that's similar to the upholstered furnishings. Okay. Okay. No, what's that standard? That standard is called a cigarette standard. Okay, how did that come about? So, let's go back in time a little bit. So, in the 70s when polyurethane foam took over from cotton, before the seven days, most mattresses most couches were filled with because it's petroleum, and the petroleum just catches on fire, you're gone. You don't have you don't have a chance. Okay. There was a big outcry, the government made a regulation in the 70s for mattresses, called the cigarette test. Okay. 16 CFR 1632. Now what's the cigarette test? The cigarette test is you take a cigarette, that's lit, you put it down on the mattress, and you see if the mattress chars turns black. And if there's charring for more than two inches, from any point on the cigarette, you fail, you cannot sell that mattress. And they do nine on one surface, and then nine on the other circuits. So, they do 18 trials. And if any of them fail, then you can so how do you how do you get to a point where it doesn't fail? And the only way to do it is with flame retardant chemicals and the conventional mattress? Yeah. Okay, so let's protect the smokers. So, I mean, right? This is like about protecting smokers. And yet we're harming healthy people and people who don't smoke, would you say if you were to guess, would you say we're better off not having flame retardants in mattresses if I had to sleep on a synthetic mattress, or a synthetic couch, and now this new TB 117 that went federal, that's going to create that cigarette test for every couch, every sofa in the country, every upholstered chair in the country is going to have to meet that standard, though. So, they're going to be adding lots of chemicals. So, if you asked me, if I had to sleep on a synthetic mattress or sit on a synthetic sofa, what I prefer with flame retardants or without flame retardants, my answer is very clear. I prefer it without the flame retardant, right?

Lisa Beres

Because your chances of dying in a fire, I would imagine are pretty low, especially compared to your chances of getting all of these illnesses linked to the chemicals returns Exactly. The flame retardants don't really solve my problem. They just trade one problem for another problem, right? And the new problem is perhaps even more risky, and more dangerous than the that should be optional. When you go to buy a mattress. Hey, you're a smoker, it's $50. If you'd like to spray. We�ll spray some chemicals on if you're really worried about falling asleep with your cigarette. I mean.

Barry A. Cik

By the way, you know, and this is a California thing. You'll see another tag on there, we can talk about tags, but there's another tag. that'll say no added flame retardants now added. See that you'll see that on all kinds of products, mostly furnishings, no added flame return. Well, guess what? The guy who made the finished product didn't add anything returns. Thank you very much. Yeah. How about the previous factory where they made some components? Yeah. How about two factories ago, your typical product, the materials will go through several factories until it gets to the final product. Yeah. So, the last guy in the chain didn't add anything but the previous person, and then they play a different kind of game. Okay. They'll say that this flame retardant was used in a previous factory, the favorite cotton was used not as a flame retardant. It's just part of the formula. Make this material thing? What's your problem? Yeah. So, there's no flame retardant. And then the last guy never add it and they give you a thing that they check. No added flame retardants, and you say, Great, that's what I want. It's great.

Lisa Beres

Yeah, you really, so much greenwashing. We talked a lot about that on the last episode, and really you guys today? I mean, it's just you have to be your own investigator, you have to ask those questions. You can't always trust manufacturers, unless you know, and you have a relationship and you'd have this trust with the manufacturer that you've trusted for a long time. But that's just the world we live in. Like you said, Barry, it's not the same world that it used to be 85,000 chemicals registered for use with the EPA, less than 200 have been adequately tested. People naively think that they have been tested and otherwise it wouldn't be for sale. So, we live in a world where we just have to do our own due diligence and ask those questions.

Ron Beres

Absolutely. You know, very, you gave us some examples already. But what are some other products or just reconfirming products that contain significant amounts of flame retardant chemicals that you can think of?

Barry A. Cik

If it's made with petroleum, it's it contains flame retardant chemicals. That's the bottom line. Right? Yeah. What you have to do is look at the product. Is it synthetic? Or is it natural? Okay, if it's synthetic, it probably can. That's the that's the easy way to, to know it at all. It's what I started this whole program with is always go back to that main, the main point, is this a synthetic petroleum-based product? Or is it a natural product? Yeah, guide us to, you know, whether you really want that product or not.

Ron Beres

Okay, how about our producer�s vinyl suit? Would that be a flame retardant? I never say anything bad about it.

Lisa Beres

No, he's joking. laughing. He's laughing. Okay, so we talked a lot about flame retardants. I'm just going to say car seats, upholstery, your mattresses, even kids� pajamas, right? If kids� pajamas are made out of a synthetic material under a certain age, and they're not snug fitting, they are required to have a flame retardant, which blew my mind when I first discovered that. But what are some of the health effects bury of these flame retardants that were being exposed to so much in today's world?

Barry A. Cik

There are there are endocrine issues, and there can sue can carcinogen issues. Those are perhaps the biggest of the issues. Okay. But, you know, for adults, there's fertility issues, fertility is becoming a very big problem. Because if you read if you read what's going on, I mean, people are people are really getting in trouble. Yeah. And what do you think is causing it? It's chemicals, that's chemical chemicals are really messing with our, our hormones and with our with our system, you know, and you know, we've even obesity can be can be.

Lisa Beres

You know, I read that some of the chemicals are obesogens. We did a blog post on this for anybody who wants to go back and find it. You can search on our blog. It's obesogens of what are obesogens they're actually chemicals that mess with your metabolism and your fat storage and your production of fat. And they are the culprits that you would suspect like BPA. Bisphenol A is a is an obesogen. I know some of the flame retardants are in fire retardants. And the list goes on. I think PFAS some of those chemicals -the perfluorinated compounds. And these are chemicals that were exposed to every day, and there are so many people struggling with weight, and we have an obesity, I would say epidemic in the country with obesity is the highest levels it's ever been, especially with children who suffer from that, which is really unfortunate, because it's tough for children to have to deal with that. And then they struggle with that the rest of their life. And that leads to all kinds of other issues. And then the hormonal issues. You know, we talked about young girls are going into puberty very, very early. Now, the infertility issues that you talked about, just hormone disruption, menopause, and pre menopause and all of these issues that really didn't exist before. And they're endocrine disruptors, these chemicals are endocrine disruptors. So, they mess with estrogen. They mess with the hormonal balance. And so, this is this goes beyond like the convenience of an inexpensive mattress. This goes beyond like, Oh, hey, that couch was just a cheap deal. And hey, yeah, that's great. You know, because we are absorbing these, we're breathing them, we're drinking them or we're being exposed, like we're sleeping on them. So, I couldn't agree more very, it's just it's, it's like, what's the tipping point? When are we going to understand that we have to take responsibility for this and for our choices?

Barry A. Cik

Yeah, there's something called regrettable substitution. Let's define that. Okay. Okay. So, manufacturers say we don't use BPA. That's nice. What do they do instead? BBB maybe.

Narrator

Yes BPS. I think was the big one. Right? That was worse.

Barry A. Cik

Yeah. So, we don't know. So that's one of the games that get played. Yeah. Industry, but we're not we don't have many products. We'll say no, no. XYZ. Yeah. Well, but what do they What are they substituting it with? See, so when they're substituting it with something that's just as bad and maybe even worse? Yeah. So, there's a term now called regrettable substitutions. And Wow, did you hear that term? That's what they're talking about.

Lisa Beres

Yeah. And I gosh, you see that everywhere now. And I think even the Environmental Working Group interview she talked about that. So some of the manufacturers know this and they're playing like cat and mouse, knowing that by the time legislation and science catches up with you know, the studies on Oh, the new harmful chemical, there are onto another one, you know, and it's just sort of staying one step ahead. They never really get their hand slapped.

Barry A. Cik

Exactly. industry is always one step ahead. And, and as long as the government just tries to go after this chemical, and then that chemical and that chemical industry can play that game all day long. They're always they're always switching the formulas; they're always finding different ways to do what they need to do. You know, like I've said, you know, if you're innocent until proven guilty, they'll always they'll always be ahead of you.

Lisa Beres

Yeah, why wouldn't you try to get away with that? And I know, we see that in the fragrance industry and the personal care industry. We see that in so many industries. So, it just always comes back to what grandma used. I mean, even right, and you talked about, we used to sleep on cotton and wool, and now it's a luxury, right? That's considered something you upgrade to. And the same thing with organic food that used to be food. And now it's, oh, gosh, you need organic, your high maintenance or you know, that's more expensive. And it's really going back to what was vinegar and baking soda to clean your home.

Barry A. Cik

Yeah, I'll give you I'll give you a statistic that you might not believe me. But it actually is a true statistic. And it makes the point as strong if not stronger than anything else I've seen. And that's a statistic about kids. All right, from the age of one year old to 19-year-old, what is the single biggest cause of death? And kids? Now from zero to one, there's SIDS, so let's ignore that. One from one to 19. Other than other than accidents, when a child dies, and unfortunately, there's a lot of that going on. What's the single biggest cause? You know what it is? No, no, it's cancer. Oh, wow. Yeah. How in the world? Does a two-year-old get cancer? Where does that come from? Wow. Okay. All right. So, if the point is made, as strong as you can make it when you're talking about a kid, and then of course you expand it, how many children have the development developmental, you know, disabilities, and so on?

Lisa Beres

How many today learning? Well, it's all over. It's everywhere all over. It's playgrounds, it's pesticides in the parks. It's nearby. Yeah. And Environmental Working Group, their body burden study found that babies are being born today in the US with 285 chemicals already in their blood on average. And they did studies in conjunction with the American Red Cross and took blood samples, and found this out. And it was really shocking. There's industrial chemicals and plasticizers, and a lot of this stuff that we're talking about. So when your child comes into this world, and already has a disadvantage, and then you put them in a polluted nursery, unknowingly, and I know Greengard, I think was part of this segment on ABC News couple years ago, where they said, hey, let's test how many chemicals is this average nursery off gassing? How many VOC�s from new furniture, the carpeting, the brand-new paint the mattress, all of this? And they found I think it was 300 chemicals. And that was just your traditional standard nursery. So, it's no surprise that we're seeing so many of these illnesses.

Ron Beres

That�s crazy. Barry, we want to empower our listeners. So how do we avoid flame retardant exposures?

Barry A. Cik

So, let's take this step by step. So, the most basic point, once again, is try to be as natural in the real sense of the word natural, too. The problem with the word natural is that it's not a regulated term. So is somebody anybody can call anything natural and get away with it. And how is the consumer supposed to figure out what really is that true? Yeah. So that becomes a difficult, but I have to be honest with you. There's no easy way. There really is no easy way. Try to try to avoid synthetics, try to use natural materials like cotton and wool, and flax and things like that. And then let's take it to the organic, all right, if the product is certified organic, it's going to be better. It won't not necessarily be the best. But it'll certainly be way better than the other than the other competitive products on the marketplace. So, if it's if it's certified organic by God's the global organic textile standard, you have, you have a good chance of a much better product. Yeah.

Lisa Beres

That's awesome. And Ron had this quote a while ago, which I love. A lot of people don't think about it, but cotton is a crop, and it's the most heavily sprayed crop in the world. Is it 25% 20 or 25% of the world's insecticides are sprayed on cotton?

Ron Beres

That�s me your quoting.

Lisa Beres

And so, this goes for even like your sheets and your clothing and Barry's wearing a cotton shirt today.

Ron Beres

And it looks dapper looks very nice.

Lisa Beres

He�s dapper and healthy. But no, it's true. And so, you are paying for not having those toxic pesticides, whether it's your sheets and your bedding, and you guys, you guys sell all of that.

Barry A. Cik

There's another certification that we really should mention, that's a good certification. It's called Made Safe. It's a very good certification. So, here's what you do, you look for a god certified product, or you look for a made safe, certified product, Greengard Gold certified product. those are those are good, good, good certifications, you can go to green America, they have they have lists of products, they're not there, they're fine. So, there are places where you can go to research the better products.

Lisa Beres

Oh, thank you for saying that. Because as we kind of touched upon last time, certifications in food is different than certifications and personal care, which is different than mattresses. So, you do need to know what to look for your website shows all the logos and shows less of the certifications, which I think is fantastic. Because it really is consumer confidence when you go there. And you see that and you know, it's not just buried saying, hey, our product is safe. It's all these third independent parties. Barry, give us a little overview of what a shopper can find on your website, besides mattresses.

Barry A. Cik

So, we're bedding related. So, in addition to the mat, we really don't make anything that goes over you when you're sleeping, we make everything that goes under. Okay. So, we have mattress toppers, a mattress topper, if you can't afford a whole mattress, you know, just get a mattress topper, just put it over what you have now. And it'll certainly be very helpful. And we make that.

Ron Beres

That�s great tip. Yeah, yeah, very comfortable to use.

Barry A. Cik

Things that really adds comfort to that matters, right? So, we make mattress toppers, then we make sheets, and we make pillows, and, and protector pads. So those are the things that we make, we also make the foundations and foundations Foundation, you know, beneath the mattress, so anything below you that that's what we specialize in.

Lisa Beres

Okay, what you would be laying on and that goes for crib mattresses, adult mattresses every kind. Well, how does nature peated avoid using flame retardant chemicals in their products.

Barry A. Cik

So, we don't use very much petroleum period. In most of our mattresses, there's essentially very little, you know, we've eliminated almost all the petroleum that's used in that in a typical mattress for, you know, certainly for certainly most of our mattresses. So that's, that's, that's the biggest single, you know, reason why we're able to avoid having to add any flame retardants. Okay, so we use organic cotton. So, we have different ways to, to, to avoid the issue. And then you know, there's, there's the design, sometimes we design things in certain ways to help make sure that there's no risk of getting something that's highly flammable. So, it's a combination of the materials and the design.

Lisa Beres

Mm hmm. Okay. And I also love that the materials which a lot of people don't know, these natural materials, like the natural latex, the wool, they're organic cotton, that they're also really good in other areas to being decimate resistant wool has a natural water repellency doesn't it wasn't well, good for like cribs, for toppers and things like that. Yeah. So, and then we talked about the breathability, you know, you're not going to be sweating all night, you have more of a cooling effect. So, these materials are good from a chemical perspective, but also a biological perspective, especially people who have dust mite allergies, which is so common today. Right?

Barry A. Cik

The more Yeah, when you when you when you go with natural materials. You're at the end of the day, you're much better off, then everything else. Yeah, no, we tried to do that as much as we can.

Lisa Beres

I love that what you guys are doing such an amazing job. You have beautiful showrooms. Your showrooms are stunning.

Ron Beres

I want to mention Amish.

Lisa Beres

Yes, let�s give a plug to the Amish. So, your factory is based in Ohio. Can you tell us a little bit about the Amish community there and how they help?

Barry A. Cik

Well, I'll tell you our inside joke if I do you know how to tell an Amish person how to do something that you need done? No. Your mouth shut because he'll figure it out before you ever will.

Lisa Beres

I love it. Yeah, that's true. Speaking of people who know how to go back to nature natural.

Barry A. Cik

Absolutely, yeah, they're there. They're good people. And, and we appreciate having them. And we treat them well. We really do. It's not a joke. And they treat us well. Yeah, they have the right to stop anything. If they don't like something, it's a different kind of factory than you might see in a typical factory. And for example, they helped us make face masks. Last year we had, when, you know, March when everything went to hell. We started making face masks and the Amish helped us and we, they were great.

Lisa Beres

Yeah, they have organic face masks, speaking of breathability, of like, if you're going to be covering your mouth all day, you don't want to be using masks that have chemicals. Your masks are organic, certified organic material, which I think is great. You're the only company I know that even sells that. And I just love that. I'm going to post the video in the show notes at Ron and Lisa comm forward slash podcast, because you guys have to watch this video of how their mattresses are manufactured. And you can see a lot of the artisans, you know making these mattresses it's really a beautiful thing to watch. You can see the care that they take, and are we our readers, they just went crazy when I did this video last time, they just loved it.

Ron Beres

Well, Barry, it goes without saying thank you again for joining us twice that was having you on the show, we learned so much as usual.

Barry A. Cik

Thank you very, it's my pleasure. And the bottom line is, we all have to become more cognizant for all the products that we get, and try to avoid the products that are that are more dangerous. And it has to come from the bottom up. Everybody has to do their part. And that's how we're going to change our society for everybody's good for us and our kids. Just everybody.

Lisa Beres

Well, well said. Okay, so Barry, a lot of customers are confused when they go to buy an organic mattress, how do they know? Does the salesperson have to tell them? or will there be a tag on the mattress that says what they're telling you is true, actually is?

Barry A. Cik

Okay. So, there are all kinds of tags. There's the old the real old tag that everybody has seen a million times where at the top of the tag it says do not remove under penalty of�

Lisa Beres

Everyone is scared to remove that!

Barry A. Cik

Oh, where did that tag come from? And why? Why is it on all the mattresses? So, let me give you the history. This tag goes back 100 years, 100 years ago, matches manufacturers were saying, well, nobody's looking under the hood. Nobody knows what we're putting in there. So why don't we just put a little bit of garbage in there, literally, and sometimes a lot more than just a little bit of garbage. Okay. And at some point in time, all that became a big, huge issue. And the government created what's called a law tag or a law label. Okay? That's what the hillbillies call it. It's a law. All right. That's the name of it. But take a look at that long label. And it will never tell you the main part of it, you'll see heavy black lines, everything within the heavy black line is that law label, it will never tell you what's on the surface, it will tell you what's inside. And so, there's two points. One is why does it not tell you what's on the surface? Because back then 100 years ago, the idea was, we can see what's on the surface, just tell us what's inside. Why do you stuffing this thing with that's number two, the law from 100 years ago was very different than what's going on today? So, they don't really have to tell you very much. And they certainly don't have to tell you about flame retardants or about chemicals or about any of that kind of stuff. So, they do have to say polyurethane foam, okay. Or they might say just urethane foam, which is the same thing, you know, or things like that. So that's one label. Then there's another label. That's, that's a flammability label for one of the two flammability tests that have to be done. Okay? And it'll tell you that it passes, it'll pass that flammability doesn't tell you how they're passing the test doesn't tell you what chemicals are using. all they're doing is saying we pass the test. And then there can be separate labels on the mattress with these private logos. So, if your GOTS certified, then yes, you'll hopefully you have you should have a God's logo on your mattress. If you're Greenguard certified, hopefully you put that logo on your mattress. And so those are voluntary by the manufacturer.

Lisa Beres

Okay, yeah. Oh, that is so good to know. So, guys, you know, if you're Well, hopefully you're not ever going to buy a conventional mattress after today, so you won't have a need to ask. But I guess you, you would also want to ask an organic mattress, Hey, what did you use for the flame retardant and they have to legally tell you a wall is our flame retardant.

Barry A. Cik

Well, let me just say something right now. They don't have to legally tell you any. Let's get that clear. Okay, if they're honest with you, and if they're certified, hopefully they'll tell you. So even. And even the certifications, like for example, even the GOTS certificate, I'm not here to criticize GOTS. GOTS is as good as it gets. Okay. So, I'm not criticizing, but even the GOTS certification allows for flame retardant chemicals, not all of them. They say, well, don't use these. Okay, we won't use these, we'll use something else. Okay. But you know, but then there's a bigger problem with some of these chemicals. And I'm not saying this is a God's problem, necessarily, but I'm just painting a broader picture. When somebody says whether it's the government or anybody else, when somebody says, do not use this chemical, what if they're able to tweak the formula? Create a different chemical? That's illegal. They met the word they met the requirement. So yeah, you know, it gets it gets a little bit loose.

Lisa Beres

Yeah. Barry, we see that in every industry in products in your home, whether it's nonstick cookware or plastic BPA, but they're doing that all the time, where they'll say it's BPA-free, but then they're using this chemical or we don't have PTFE, but we're using another replacement chemical. So yeah, guys, I mean, at the end of the day, and Barry was talking about GOTS, which is GOTS, the Global Organic Textile Standard. That's the tag you want to look for. And really, at the end of the day, look for a brand you can trust, a brand that isn't trying to hide anything and that is happy to answer your questions and be transparent, like Naturepedic.

So, thanks, Barry, thank you. Thank you, friends. We hope you have enjoyed this show as much as we have. Are you ready to enjoy a healthier nontoxic sleep? I hope so after this show. Join your organic mattress revolution and rest easier on a certified organic mattress. Proudly crafted in the USA without petrochemicals, flame retardants, polyurethane foam and other toxic materials. Visit Naturepedic.com that's nature p e d I c and get ready to snooze in the lap of organic luxury. And listeners Don't forget to use code Ron and Lisa 15 that's Ron and Lisa 15 to save 15% on new mattresses bedding for the whole family. That's Naturepedic.com

Ron Beres

And head to www.RonandLisa.com for your chance to win your very own Naturepedic mattress. We'll see you next week everyone. Thank you for joining us!

Narrator

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