Car seats and cot mattresses - is the tip the only place for them?

[Spareincoming]

We have multiple outgrown car seats, many hardly used as they’ve been the grandparent car car seats, from baby seats to high back boosters, some less than a year old due to car insurance replacements and several hardly used cot/cotbed mattresses (all used for 2 nights maximum - don’t ask!)

Is there anywhere that will take them or is it destination tip?

Seems such a waste!

I've had this problem. You can offer old car seats to fire stations for them to practice cutting people out of, and offer old cot mattresses on freecycle as suitable for dog beds.

You could post them on freecycle.

Put two covers on each cot mattress, one each side, stack them up and call it a play couch and you’ve just saved yourself a couple of hundred quid.

I know it is for safety, but it’s all so wasteful! I wish the car seat makers would take the car seats back to repurpose the plastics or whatever.

If you have relatively new car seats from premium safety brands, there is a Facebook group that allows resale. This probably won't be helpful to most people looking to get rid of car seats though. I got rid of a cot mattress to someone on Olio, she wanted it to reupholster a bench or something.

We've given them to friends who trust us when we say they've never been in an accident. Otherwise I would say fire station as demo or practice ones, or the tip. It seems awfully wasteful, but I wouldn't want to encourage someone to use a second hand one they didn't know the origin of.

People do buy car seats on FB marketplace and if you are happy they are safe then there's no moral issue with selling them.

Do destroy them if they have been in any accidents or have signs of stress to the plastic or wear on the harness, they have mould, especially on the harness, any part does not work, they have had unauthorised repairs done on them, or they are more than 10 years old. If selling without the insert for younger children, state this on the listing and emphasise that it is not for use under (whatever age/size/weight the manual gives for the insert). If the manual is missing make sure to send the buyer a PDF copy or link where they can download one.

The fire station thing is a myth apparently.

The Lullaby Trust retracted their advice against second hand cot mattresses years ago so if you have a local place which will take them, feel free to donate.

I’ve picked up a free car seat barely used from a grandparent on Facebook marketplace. Definitely list them! Explain they are barely used. Offer for £10 or free or whatever. Sometimes free people mess around on collection times so a low amount works.

again list on Facebook market place about the cot mattress.! If stain free someone will have them!!!!

People near me give away car seats via Facebook or similar. Seems fine for a spare/grandparent occasional use.

We use a good quality, not well used cot mattress (was large size) as a spare bed (on floor) for visiting small child. Play sofa idea is good too

Do you have a local baby bank? They usually take car seats. And seconding other posters find somewhere to use the cot mattress as a cushion, ours is sewn into a waterproof cover and lives in the Wendy house outside.

When I was little we would have kept them and the old prams and made very very unsafe gocarts.

An animal charity might take the cot mattresses to use as beds?

Or if you are crafty, depending on the material you can cut them down to use as cushion inserts or to make a window seat.