As Phase One of the ’200 Stories’ project wraps up, Edge Environment is pleased to have engaged with 200 businesses in the Northern Beaches to reduce waste going to landfill. Over the last four months Edger’s have been out and about talking to local businesses about their current waste and recycling set up. The Team identified opportunities for businesses to not only reduce the amount of waste going to landfill but also save money by reducing their bin lifts or general waste collection. Some great stories have evolved from the 200 Stories project. A few are captured below. The Shop Next Door: The Shop Next Door in Manly are recycling 100% of their used coffee grinds by re-bagging them and giving them to customers for their compost and worm farms. They have also signed up to the Terracycle Brigade and are recycling cigarettes from the Laundromat one shop down so the butts don’t end up in storm water and in the ocean. They have started to separate soft plastic packaging from the apparel and surfboards. They have reduced their general waste bin contents by half, and over 12 months this will equate to 13,000kg of general waste diverted from landfill. Mitchel Bro’s 4X4: Aaron from Mitchel Bro’s has reduced his general waste collection significantly since the Bin Trim action plan was put in place. He has reduced his general waste collection from once per week to once a month by recycling plastic car bumper bars, soft plastic packaging/bubble wrap and engine oil filters. The plastic car bumper bars would take up 80% of the bins contents these are now being picked up by a bumper recycler who reconditions them or donates them to a recycler to create new products. Aaron is now saving $1500 on his annual waste bill’s and is recycling an additional 35,000 litres of waste annually but more importantly is really happy about increasing his business recycling efforts. ‘The plan is working really well, we’ve already had a couple of hard plastics collections and the team know exactly what they’ve gotta do now and it’s really saving us a heap of time, money and resources. We’ve found the biggest improvement so far in the removal of the soft plastics, I didn’t realise how much space they really consumed in the general waste.” Email Quote from Aaron Mitchell- Mitchel Bro’s 4×4 Edge Environment is proud to be working locally to provide long term sustainability solutions in the Northern Beaches. The next phase of the project involves supporting businesses to implement the Bin Trim Action Plans and then completing follow up waste assessments to determine the landfill savings.