In my last post, I completely forgot to add to the recycling mix all the ongoing recycling we already have in place. How could I have missed mentioning all the cardboard, glass and plastic we recycle year after year? Any grocery business worth its salt has these programs in place. Whether by state mandate or industry support, large-scale recycling has been around for decades. More and more, though, businesses are getting on board with ease, made simple by a recycling industry that has developed both collection procedures and destination markets for these products.

Let’s take a closer look at the Willamette store and its amazing weekly numbers:

• Crushed Aluminum – 390 lbs
• Crushed Plastic – 165 lbs
• Squished Plastic Wrap – 150 lbs
• Crushed Glass – 7,650 lbs
• Cardboard Bales – 10,500 lbs

These numbers equal 18,855 lbs (9 tons) of recycled materials each week, 75,420 lbs (37 tons) per month for a whopping 905,040 lbs (452 tons) per year.

Let’s add that to five months of recycling and composting data we already have and that’s a grand total of 518 tons of diverted material and 315 tons of trash per year.

Next time, we’ll look at where these recycled products go and what happens to them. I’m thinking we’ll start with cardboard.

See you back here soon!

Discovering a workable system for composting and recycling can be tricky. It took a lot of stratagem to find the right color and size container for each location in our stores, so that employees could work without being impeded by the new program, both physically and mentally.

The main strategy was to decrease the number of garbage containers with more compost and recycling containers. What I found worked best was color coordinating. I designated green containers as compost and used green compostable bags to match.

The same was done for recycling; I choose grey and black containers and color-coded them blue. And I changed nothing about the regular garbage containers, except ensuring that they were lined with bio-degradable liners so they would break down in the dump and expose the material to decay.

But before I set about placing all these colored receptacles around the store for use, I had to get employees used to the new color system, so color-coded signage was key.

As I said earlier, green for compost, blue for recycling and black and grey for garbage. I posted these signs in all departments, by the restrooms, hallways, water coolers, corners of walls and at the top and bottom of stairwells. Everyone had a chance to get familiar with the colors even before the program was implemented.

While my hope was to have everyone up to speed and well educated, it was still necessary to work with people one on one to explain how the program worked. Of course some were resistant to change. And there were many questions to answer and skepticism over whether it could be done.

These are some of the comments I heard: “I’ll never get it straight.” “It’s too difficult and too complicated.”

I explained that it would take some adjustment, but that it would get easier and clearer as time went on.

Today, those who doubted the program are now asking questions like: “How much garbage is being diverted?”

I guess I consider that a job well done. 

Hello everyone. John here. I’d like to share with you some hard numbers and a picture of the past, the present and the future of garbage, compost and recycling at our stores, specifically our Delta Oaks and Willamette locations.

Background
Real-time composting began in April and August 2009 and at our Delta and Willamette stores, respectively. Since then, we have compiled several months of data.

Over the last nine months, our employees have made a concerted effort to compost more matter, creating many, many happy microbes and feeding the belly of huge recycling machines off site.

While both stores previously recycled, the amount composted was much less due to the containers we used previously. Larger receptacles installed last year have catapulted our recycling numbers and lowered the amount of garbage going into the landfill.

At Delta
Prior to composting, the Delta store generated an average of 16.78 tons per month. After we began composting, the garbage tonnage dropped to an eye-opening 9.31 tons per month on average, and redirected an average of 7.47 tons of compost and recycling materials per month. A great big hand to the Delta employees for sustaining the program.

At Willamette
The Willamette store, the largest of all our stores, also did well. With no composting program in place, Willamette generated an average of 33 tons of garbage per month. With lessons learned at Delta, the newly implemented composting program we redirected a whopping 13 tons per month. Garbage was reduced to an average of 17 tons per month.

All said, we redirected 16 tons per month through composting and accelerating our recycling. Hooray for our Willamette employees and the program!

In Summary
To wrap up this numbers game, we redirected approximately 27 percent of our total tonnage to compost and recycling at Willamette and Delta after the program began. In 2010, we are looking forward to compiling a full year of statistics for both stores allowing us to report more concise numbers. So be sure to check back. And we are looking forward to implementing robust composting program at our other stores in the very near future.