Upcycling is the process of taking waste materials, offcuts, or discarded products and transforming them directly into something new — without breaking the material down first. The distinction from recycling matters: recycling typically degrades a material back to its raw state before reforming it into something new, often at lower quality. Upcycling retains the material as-is, redirecting it into a new use that matches or exceeds its original value.
Both reduce landfill waste. Upcycling does it with less energy and without the material losses that occur during breakdown and reprocessing.
Upcycled Organic Latex in Avocado Pillows
When Avocado cuts GOLS-certified organic latex foam to shape mattress cores, the process generates offcuts — certified organic latex that meets the same GOLS standard as the cores but cannot be used in its original form. Rather than disposing of it, we cross-cut the offcuts into noodle-like strips and use them as the fill in our organic pillows, blended with kapok — a lightweight, renewable plant fiber from the kapok tree.
The result is pillow fill that is GOLS-certified organic, naturally buoyant, and adjustable — and material that would otherwise have been discarded is kept entirely within the certified organic product system.
This fill is used in our:
Upcycled Hardwood Offcuts in Our Zero Waste Furniture Collection
Our Fullerton, California woodshop generates hardwood offcuts during furniture manufacturing — solid North American hardwood pieces that are too small for standard furniture components but too good to waste. Our Zero Waste collection is crafted exclusively from these offcuts, turning manufacturing scrap into finished furniture pieces rather than sending it to landfill.
The collection was inspired by the 90% zero waste certification threshold and reflects the same principle that runs through our mattress material choices: the best waste is waste that never enters the disposal stream in the first place.
Reclaimed Wood in Our Natural Wood Collection
Our Natural Wood Collection extends the same principle upstream, using reclaimed woods that would otherwise leave the material cycle entirely — wood with a prior use history that is brought back into finished furniture rather than discarded.
How Upcycling Fits Into Avocado's Broader Circularity Work
Upcycling is one part of Avocado's approach to keeping materials out of landfill at every stage of the product lifecycle. In 2025, Avocado achieved an 88% landfill diversion rate across our Los Angeles manufacturing and distribution facilities, validated by UL Solutions under the UL 2799 Environmental Claim Validation program — with a target of 90% (UL Silver) by the end of 2026.
For more on how Avocado handles returned mattresses and end-of-life materials, see What Happens to Returned Avocado Mattresses