The program was spearheaded by “Leaders for the Future,” a group of sixth-graders at Lawrence Intermediate School. The “Leaders for the Future,” a group of sixth-graders at Lawrence Intermediate School (LIS), spearheaded a recycling program at Lawrence Intermediate School. The students began the planning stages in January during a two-day character education program, sponsored by State Farm Insurance. Students developed a plan of action to reduce the amount of trash from the cafeteria and individual classrooms by setting out bins in the lunch room to collect Capri Sun drink pouches and Frito-Lay chip bags. The leadership group packaged the recycled goods and sent them to TerraCycle in Trenton, N.J.

11-06-06--Times

I am very excited by this development and commend Pepsi for their action and effort, [but] I fear it may be overstating things quite a bit. As I see it there are two main challenges to bio-plastics and compostable packaging.

TerraCycle got a cover story in the magazine El Empaque, continue reading this post to read the article.

You as packaging designers manage some amazing feats: Simultaneously satisfy picky company leaders, fickle consumers and just plain crazy marketing people! You’re to be applauded–it’s a tough balancing act. But I have something further for you to consider. Your packaging, for the most part, has one use. What you create encompassed countless hours of meetings, designs, redesigns, factory tooling, wrestling matches and so on. It’s the front line of how your company’s products are seen in the world. It’s the final leg of the marathon that began with coming up with the idea for the product, perhaps testing it out with consumers, a final iteration chosen, then finished when someone decides to grab one of your products off the shelf and buy it. But once the wrapping’s off, the bottle’s empty, the usefulness is done, that’s the end of the story. Some of it gets recycled. A lot of it doesn’t. Either way, all that brand equity you’ve put into the product is being wasted. Say again? Yes, when your packaging has no end of life solution, it’s clumsily being made for you, typically. Terracycle since the start has been about providing one that companies have much more control over: Upcycling it into new products, which often directly use the packaging in its original form in durable goods, retaining brand equity for much longer then one use. Designing for recyclability is a noble idea and one to be encouraged but, with a fairly limited range of materials, getting recycled in the U.S., it’s just not always possible. Or, in the case of food packaging, safe. It’s time, both for the sake of saving resources (financial and environmental) to design for reuse where possible, and upcycling by companies like TerraCycle <http://www.terracycle.net>  where it’s not. In both cases, you’re benefitting the company due to extended presence in a consumer’s life, showing you’re out for more than just the sale, and you’ve done your part to keep waste out of the landfill, or worse, littering the ground. Is there a downside to changing/expanding the way you think about packaging? It could cost more. It could take additional time and resources to implement. In the case of SunChips <http://www.packagingdigest.com/article/510820-Frito_Lay_withdraws_noisy_compostable_SunChips_bag.php> , it could cause consumer backlash. Yes, sometimes we’re great at coming up with reasons why not. In this economy and any time really, I suggest we all get much less skilled in that arena, and start finding ways to say yes. To better packaging solutions that use less, save more, serve customers just as well, and live on beyond first use. It’s, in my opinion, the only sensible thing to do. What are your thoughts? Being in the packaging design trenches, where are some opportunities for improvement? Where are the road bumps? Where are the emerging solutions? What are some recent successes to emulate, learn from? Jump into the comments, below.

Posted by admin on February 20, 2011 under 2011 <http://www.blytheparkpta.org/?cat=57> ,  2011 February <http://www.blytheparkpta.org/?cat=70> ,  Fundraising <http://www.blytheparkpta.org/?cat=25>  |              Keep sending your upcycling items for Terracycle!  We have sent off another box of over 1,500 ziploc bags.   Save your Chip Bags (Fritolay and similar other similar chip bags), drink pouches (Capri Sun and any other similar pouches) Storage Bags (Ziploc and any other brands) and newly added Ink Cartridges.  We currently collect Printer Ink Cartridges but now we will be sending them to Terracyle.   Bring them to school and deposit them in our collection center located right outside the school office. Blythe Park School will earn 2 cents for every bag we send to Terracyle and $.25 for every ink cartidges. Any questions, please contact Lisa Gaynor or Josie Diaz-Pope.     Comments are closed.                home <http://www.blytheparkpta.org>   top <http://www.blytheparkpta.org/?p=2194#>

One man's garbage is another man's treasure. While the concept is as old as the hills, it's taken on a new, greener meaning this decade. And it even has a new name: upcycling. "Upcycling is finding value in the material as it exists now, retaining that value or increasing it by turning it into a new creation," explained Stacey Cusack, 26, public relations manager for a company born from the upcycle theory called Terracycle, Inc. based in Trenton, N.J. The term "upcycle" is attributed to William McDonough, one of the co-authors of the book "Cradle to Cradle," published in 2002. "Our founder, Tom Szaky considers (McDonough) his mentor," Cusack said. Szaky, according to Cusack, dropped out of Princeton University almost 10 years ago at age 19 to start what would become Terracycle, a global upcycling company that converts trash (snack bags, cookie wrappers, and drink pouches) into a variety of products, such as Frito Lay messenger bags, Skittle kites and Capri Sun totes.

Tom Szaky, the 28-year-old founder of  TerraCycle, one of the fastest growing green companies in the world, is making a business out of recycling and a name for himself as "#1 CEO in America Under 30."

New Jersey-based TerraCycle collects waste packaging from over 60,000 schools and community groups nationwide and “upcycles” them into new, useful products. Known for their “Brigades,” which has students and groups collecting everything from single use drink pouches to empty yogurt containers, Terracycle pays for shipping, prints the shipping labels the Brigades use, keeps track of how many items each Brigade has collected and even provides the shipping boxes. To make the Brigade program successful, TerraCycle has partnered with a number of well-known manufacturers like Kraft, PepsiCo and PaperMate to help turn the nonrecyclable into recyclable. Earlier in the year, TerraCycle partnered with Walmart to showcase and sell a wide variety of the repurposed products they’d created including tote bags made from Frito-Lay wrappers and purses and shoulder bags made from candy wrappers like M&M’s and Skittles. Terracycle has expanded its recycling program into eleven countries and, since its 2001 founding, has diverted billions of pieces of waste that were either upcycled or recycled into over 1,500 different products. They partnered with Toys R Us and Macy’s in New Jersey to collect in-store materials like used sneakers, shoes, used diaper packaging and used and broken toys. They’re discussing a possible regional program roll-out in the northeast. TerraCycle has also opened several retail stores featuring their innovative “new” products. They’ve also developed the TerraCycle Classroom Curriculum to teach students about the problems of and solutions to waste. TerraCycle is a company with both a vision and the ability to give trash a new, useful second life. You can find out more about them at www.Terracycle.net <http://www.Terracycle.net> .