Last week on Facebook, I entered a contest all I did was leave my blog link (as a comment) on Terracycle's Fan Page. This morning I had a message saying that I won. Yay!!  I of course don't know what the prize is until it gets here. But I wanted to share this site with yall. I stumbled across Terracycle when I was ... yes I don't remember what I was doing. They recycle all kinds of things into new things. Some of these things will be available only next month(April) in Walmart Stores. Here is some more information about it; the information is copied in part with permission. "A whole bunch of brand new TerraCycle items will be available, during April for a limited time only, at every single Walmart across the country. Starting April 5th, nearly 60 TerraCycle products will be sold right next to the original items they were made from. Cheetos kites and tote bags made from Frito-Lay wrappers will be sold with bags of Frito-Lay chips, while notebooks and purses made out of skittles and M&M wrappers will be sold right next to bags of Mars Candy. For those of you unfamiliar with the trash to treasure company, TerraCycle, here is a little background information: TerraCycle collects traditionally non-recyclable waste from people all across the country by paying a non-profit of the person collectings choice, 2 cents for each piece they collect and mail to the company, with the use of a pre-paid shipping label they can print right from the TerraCycle website (www.TerraCycle.net). A majority of TerraCycle’s active participants are schools, because the students usually bring in the items TerraCycle collects during lunch; such as juice pouches, chip bags, and cookie wrappers, plus the money can go right back to the school. TerraCycle uses the waste it receives from its Brigade members to make hundreds of products that are not only eco-friendly, but are also very affordable because its made from waste!"

Price: $14.99 These iPod speakers are made with wrappers from food conglomerate Mars that would have gone to waste. The speakers come in different designs, either M&M wrappers, Skittles or Starburst (pictured here). The speakers don’t require batteries or need to be plugged into an outlet, making them safer for the environment.

TerraCycle was founded by a brainiac college student back in 2001 & started as organic fertilizer company {ever see the  worm poop in an upcycled soda bottle?} in addition ~ they run free national collection programs to collect wrappers from tons of products from companies like Frito Lay (Pepsi), Kraft Foods, Stonyfield Farm, Mars Wrigley {and many more.} from schools & non-profits & regular people like you & me!

As you may have read earlier, we recently partnered with Mars in our largest post industrial collection agreement. That means that packaging for more then 20 brands that were imperfect or no longer current will find new use and life, when they were otherwise done. Mars, you may be surprised to know, has made a deep commitment to being a sustainable company. I had the privilege of talking with Howard-Yana Shapiro, Global Director Plant Science and External Research at Mars and Foudner of Seeds of Changes, about their ambitious goal of 200,000 tons of sustainably certified cocoa by 2020, their open book mapping of tree genomes for non GMO improvement of trees in our changing climate, and a term I'd never heard of, agroecology. Learn from this Fulbright scholar why Mars is so focused on sustainability, how Seeds of Change was able to stay on track after it became a part of Mars, and how his expertise and focus on environmental responsibility is influencing one the world's largest food and beverage manufacturers. Tom Szaky: How will UTZ Certified insure that all cocoa is certified? Not just the source overall, but each actual ton? How frequently do they monitor the same place?