LiveWell Colorado is sponsoring a Candy Swap in Denver and Lone Tree, Colo. in the days following Halloween this year. On Friday, Nov. 2, take your candy bowl downtown between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. to exchange it for a fresh fruit bowl. LiveWell will be on the 16th Street Mall between Curtis & Champa, in front of Bellco Credit Union. On Saturday, Nov. 3, the candy swap will take place in Lone Tree from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. In addition to fresh fruit, there will be other items for swapping, such as jump ropes and frisbees. Find the Candy Swap at the Bellco Credit Union at 9220 Park Meadows Drive. Both dates and locations will feature music, giveaways, and the LiveWell Rally Man. Participants will also be eligible to win a pair of Justin Beiber concert tickets. LiveWell Colorado has also said that the candy wrappers will be given to Terracycle, who will upcycle them, creating products and donating a portion of the proceeds back to LiveWell Colorado.

Terracycle will be partnering with Mars, Inc. to upcycle candy wrappers into consumer products such as laptop sleeves. A Sweet Alternative Eco-conscious folks have thought of creative ways to repurpose candy wrappers. A quick search on the Internet for items made out of candy wrappers will generate page after page of handbags, wallets and even candy-wrapper jewelry.Upcycling company TerraCycle is working to reduce the amount of candy wrappers headed for the landfills by teaming up with one of the world’s largest candy makers, Mars, Incorporated. The idea is to turn packaging, including candy wrappers, into consumer goods. TerraCycle will upcycle wrappers from M&M’S, , Snickers, Milky Way, Twix, Starburst, Skittles and 3 Musketeers. The material will be reused for backpacks, tote bags, messenger bags and even cell phone holders and laptop sleeves. Albe Zakes, vice president of media relations for TerraCycle, believes the repurposing initiative, or upcycling, offers an easy and convenient way for consumers to recycle candy wrappers. “We hope to inspire consumers and corporations to think about the end-life cycle of food wrappers,” he say

Follow these instructions, provided by TerraCycle, and learn how easy it is to recycle your empty candy wrappers into a fun gift bag.

You can save either the JPG version or PDF version of this project sheet. Right click on your desired version here and then save it to your computer.

• Download PDF File
• Download JPG File

If you have completed this project and still have more candy wrappers to upcycle, be sure to sign up for Terracycle's Candy Wrapper Brigade and send them in!

TerraCycle's Candy Wrapper Brigade collects empty candy wrappers, donates money or charitable gifts to the organizations that send them in, and turns the waste into new items. And … we made it through Hurricane Sandy. My family and I were hunkered down for two and a half days and were without power for one of those days. I feel fortunate. There are still hundreds of thousands of people without power, and not too far from me at the Jersey Shore, as well as other places in the region, people and businesses have lost everything. When the power finally came back on yesterday afternoon, I couldn’t turn off the news. The scenes of the devastation are heartbreaking. As the East Coast starts its cleanup, most of the rest of the country is celebrating Halloween. Our town’s trick-or-treating has been moved to Saturday, and most of the towns around me have postponed it until sometime later in the week. Eventually, those of us with kids will have piles of candy in our homes. When that candy gets eaten, we’ll have piles of candy wrappers.  Did you know that you can recycle many of those wrappers? TerraCycle’s Candy Wrapper Brigade is a recycling program that accepts any brand and any size candy wrappers. What would normally end up as waste in a landfill gets turned into new products like messenger bags, kites and picture frames. This program is a fundraising program for charities, schools and nonprofits. Organizations can sign up, and the wrappers that they send in can earn them 2 cents a wrapper or two TerraCycle points that can be redeemed for charity gifts like providing meals or planting trees. According to the TerraCycle website, participating is easy after an organization has gone through the free signup process. Here is what you need to do.

1. Collect enough approved candy wrappers to fill up a box or bag. The waste does not need to be cleaned or stacked.
2. Download a pre-paid shipping label from the website.
3. Drop the box off at a UPS location.

TerraCycle is a company renowned for turning trash into treasure. Here's an inside look at the graffiti-clad warehouse in Trenton, N.J. where much of the upcycling magic happens.Late last week, I had the pleasure of touring the Trenton, N.J. offices of TerraCycle, a “waste solution development” firm with the most admirable mission to "eliminate the idea of waste."

3. Give candy wrappers a second life. If you simply must eat the candy Halloween brings—admittedly, most of us do—try something unique with those Snickers wrappers. For the craft-minded, take on a project like this colorful pouch or these cute barrettes. For a simple solution, send the trash to TerraCycle’s Candy Wrapper Brigade. The company, which donates two cents for every waste unit collected, takes wrappers of any size candy and from any brand. Poof, your garbage becomes a notebook, a tote bag, even a park bench. Since the Brigade began three years ago, nearly 5.5 million wrappers have been upcycled instead of heading to a landfill.

Protect our Earth with these ultra hip school supplies from TerraCycle – all of which are made from upcycled materials. Each product, from backpacks to pencil cases to notebooks, is upcycled from common trash items you might find in any classroom or cafeteria such as drink pouches, chip bags and granola bar wrappers. TerraCycle pays schools and charities to collect their trash and send it to them, free of charge. And for every item they receive, TerraCycle donates money to the school or a charity of the school’s choice. Sign up at http://www.terracycle.com/en-US/ and visit http://www.dwellsmart.com/Products/School-and-Art-Supplies to purchase.

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- The Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State wants to collect 5,000 candy wrappers during the 2012-13 season to benefit the charity Feeding America. Through a TerraCycle program called the Candy Wrapper Brigade, which awards points for each wrapper collected, the Center for the Performing Arts would be able to provide 200 meals through Feeding America, a national charity with the mission to provide nourishment to America’s hungry through a nationwide network of member food banks. “We’ve had lots of requests to do something to help people more locally,” said Peg Lucas, a member of the Center for the Performing Arts Green Team. “Since we have participation from people who live in numerous counties, and it’s more profitable through TerraCycle® to use points than actual monetary value in return for wrappers collected, we decided that the Feeding America program is about as local as we can get. Our goal of 5,000 wrappers is equal to 200 meals versus $250.” Last season the performing arts center collected more than 6,400 wrappers that were redeemed to provide clean drinking water for a year to 43 people in developing countries. Patrons attending events at Eisenhower Auditorium, on the corner of Shortlidge and Eisenhower roads at University Park, may place used candy wrappers in lobby collection boxes. Eligible waste -- from auditorium concession sales or from home or office use -- includes individual candy wrappers, large candy bags and multi-pack candy bags. Candy wrappers and bags may also be dropped off at Eisenhower during regular business hours, weekdays 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., or at the Penn State Downtown Theatre Center (146 S. Allen St., State College), weekdays 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Saturdays 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Penn State employees may send candy wrappers and bags via campus mail to Pam Aikey, Eisenhower Auditorium, or Shannon Bishop, Penn State Downtown Theatre Center. Each year millions of candy wrappers are needlessly thrown away, and most end up in landfills. TerraCycle® partners with Mars®, Wrigley® and Cadbury® to create a second life for candy packaging, but all brands of wrappers and candy bags are accepted for the recycling program. Learn more about the program at www.terracycle.net. Find out what else is going on at the Center for the Performing Arts at www.cpa.psu.edu.

With Hillsborough High School having received more than $2,000 worth of benefits from participating in TerraCycle programs since 2010, technology teacher Tim Zavacki has some big plans for this upcoming school year.   TerraCycle is an "upcycle" company that makes consumer products from pre- and post-consumer materials. Organizations are able to participate in the company's programs, donating what would normally be trash such as chip bags, candy wrappers, cereal boxes, apparel and electronics to be “upcycled” and used for new products such as duffel bags, tiles, and school supplies. Over 83,000 items have been upcycled since 2010.   “I have been named a most valuable collector by TerraCycle for being in the top 100 in the USA for successful collections,” Zavacki said.   The school has found success with TerraCycle, winning its Erase Your E-Waste Keyboard and Mouse Brigade last year, receiving brand-new Logitech keyboards and mice in return. Zavacki was able to distribute them throughout the school for teachers and students to use.

While most of his peers were at the library, or the bar, college freshmen Tom Szaky was busy launching a business out of his dorm room. For his first product he turned worm-poop into fertilizer as a way to transform waste into something useful. Since then he’s turned that first product into a multi-million dollar business Terracycle, with clients including Walmart and Home Depot. Inspiyr spoke with Tom about the mission of Terracycle, his favorite type of trash, and some advice for budding entrepreneurs or anyone looking to achieve their dreams.