Sad, but true: Many companies make deceptive, and often unsubstantiated, claims about the environmental benefits of their products.

It’s called greenwashing.

The term was originally coined by Jay Westerveld, a New York environmentalist, in an essay he wrote in 1986 condemning the hotel industry for placing notes in hotel rooms encouraging reuse of towels (less washing) to “save the environment” when the practice was more profit motivated than environmentally conscious.

Despite the existence of the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) Green Guides to combat deceptive advertising practices related to “green” claims, a growing number of brands are touting environmental benefits that are ultimately pure fiction.

I love Benjamin Moore paint, but the company got in big trouble with the FTC in 2017 when they marketed their Natura paint collection as “zero emissions.” As we covered in a previous blog post about “The Truth About Chemical-Free Mattress Claims,” zero emissions is simply not a reasonable statement.

As per The Wall Street Journal, “the FTC sued Truly Organic Inc. in 2019, alleging many of the company’s products were falsely labeled with terms including ‘100% organic.’ The company and its founder and chief executive agreed to pay $1.76 million to settle the complaint.” 

Since we were first established in 2008, the CertiPUR-US® program has done everything possible to avoid greenwashing—and to build into our program rules that discourage participating companies from engaging in greenwashing.

Here are the facts. And we’re proud of them.

Certified foams are:

• Made without formaldehyde
• Made without ozone depleters
• Made without phthalates regulated by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission
• Made without mercury, lead and other heavy metals
• Low VOC (volatile organic compound) emissions for indoor air quality (less than 0.5 parts per million)
• Screened for relevant chemicals, including flame retardants, that are classified as carcinogens, mutagens or reproductive toxins and are harmful to human health

To become CertiPUR-US certified, foam samples are taken at the manufacturing stage and sent to one of four approved independent, accredited testing laboratories to be analyzed for content and emissions.

Samples are screened for relevant chemicals (chemicals that could potentially be used in the manufacture of flexible polyurethane foam) that are classified as carcinogenic (may cause cancer), mutagenic (may cause genetic defects) or reprotoxic (may damage fertility or an unborn child) by the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS). GHS is an internationally agreed-upon standard managed by the United Nations that was set up to replace the assortment of hazardous material classification and labeling systems previously used around the world.

Additional testing of foam samples is done to detect the presence of lead, mercury and other heavy metals. Certified foams meet the Consumer Product Safety Commission toy standard for lead.

Certified foams are subject to random verification testing. CertiPUR-US program representatives make virtual or on-site visits to participating foam production plants to obtain samples of certified foam, which are then tested at the program’s expense to confirm compliance.

Companies participating in the CertiPUR-US program must sign an agreement to follow our rules, which include adhering to the FTC Green Guides. We also require a representative from each company to take our 20-minute online certificate of knowledge course, which includes information about claims that can and cannot be made to comply with our rules, to demonstrate that they fully understand the guidelines.

Despite our best efforts, some companies still make false claims about our program. So, if you have questions about the CertiPUR-US program, you can rely on our website. To be sure a company is participating with us and using certified foam in their products, look them up in our directory of participating companies and brands at www.certipur.us/directory. If a company is not listed, we cannot vouch for their use of certified foam.

Note to participating bedding and upholstered furniture manufacturers: It’s time to renew your registration for 2025 now. The deadline is January 31, 2025, but as soon as you renew, your listing will say “valid through 2025.”