The items will be recycled by Terra Cycle when goals are reached and the program is aiming at collecting more than 500 items from each category each month. Following is the list of items which can be dropped off: Mars or Wrigley brand candy bar wrappers; energy bar wrappers; drink pouches; Nabisco cookie wrappers; Kashi brand wrappers or boxes; toasted chip bags; Bear Naked brand wrappers; wine bottle corks; Aveeno product tubes; Scotch tape dispensers and cores; Frito Lay chip bags; Malt-O-Meal cereal bags or boxes; Elmer's glue; Huggie's brand diaper or pull-up bag packaging; Scott's brand packaging; Neosporin brand packaging; lunchable kits; spread (butter) containers; gum wrappers; cell phones; Colgate brand packaging; yogurt cups; writing instruments; Starbucks coffee bags; plastic bottle lids; and used gift cards

Tom Szaky’s company, TerraCycle <http://www.terracycle.net/> , collects post-consumer waste, such as Carpi Sun pouches and Oreo cookie wrappers, and turns them into entirely new products such as backpacks and pencil cases.  While Szaky’s “upcycling” business has an authentic environmental aura, it’s his partnerships with big companies like Kraft and Nabisco that make the business work.  Those large packaged goods companies sponsor the collection brigades that provide TerraCycle with used packaging. It’s an unlikely alliance, but one that gives the big companies a “green” image, while providing TerraCycle with low cost or free raw materials.

The Sandy Valley High School Science Club is embarking on a recycling project called the "TerraCycle Recycling Brigade." The science club will collect used and empty Carpri-Sun pouches, Elmers Glue containers (both sticks and bottles), Plastic Baggies (like Ziploc), Cookie Wrappers (like Nabisco, Grandma's and Oreo's) and old cell phones. All items donated will be counted and turned into the TerraCycle company, who will in turn pay the school for every item sent in. This helps divert trash from the landfill and earns for a SV Science Club Scholarship and field-trips.

The project partners the school with a company called TerraCycle, which pays the school 2 cents for commonly-disposed wrappers for candy bars, potato chips and other items. TerraCycle then turns the garbage into accessories such as backpacks and purse, according to fifth grade teacher Diane Roethler. “These aren’t things that can go in curbside recycling,” Roethler said. “This company has found a specific use for these items and a specific product that they can make from it.” Roethler hopes to use the money earned through the TerraCycle program to raise extra money for the school to purchase supplies. During the three weeks she collected material during the last school year, Roethler collected 2,200 items for more than $44. She expects to earn even more this year now that the parents and students are more familiar with the program.

I'm happy to announce that I am totally becoming a green Queen. Sure I still have my faults. I love to use plastic bags and paper plates but I do recycle them. On the other hand I have tried out eco-friendly recycled plates, bio-degradable bags and many other eco-friendly products! Yet, sometimes I run into some products that the recycle center won't pick up or that could be used somewhere else. That's where Terracycle <http://www.terracycle.net/>  comes in. I first heard about Terracycle through Bare Naked Granola. My husband and I love to eat BN Granola with our yogurt for breakfast. On the back I noticed an ad telling you that you could send in your empty BN bags and they could be upcyled into something new. How about something new and cool! I've seen everything from Backpacks to umbrellas! Here's a little bit more about Terracycle! This video explains it the best and I'm a visual person so I thought I would share. It really helped to clarify it all for me.

While some entrepreneurs discover their business plans unintentionally contain excrement, Tom Szaky's was designed around the material. Worm dung, in fact. Inspired by the success his friends had using red wiggler worms to process compost, Szaky felt there could be a business in commercially producing and distributing a product he would call ‘Worm Poop'. Emboldened by taking fifth place in the Princeton Business Plan Contest, he quit Princeton after two years to form TerraCycle and devote himself to delivering Worm Poop to households everywhere. THE SMELL OF SUCCESS With $20,000 — the proceeds of Szaky's bank accounts and credit cards — he purchased a worm gin and began shovelling Princeton University's food waste into it to feed an ever-growing colony of worms. A worm can consume twice its body weight each day, so Szaky was soon up to his knees in product. Committed to a fully sustainable offering, he packaged his prized Worm Poop in paper bags and took it to gardening stores inviting them to stock it. The response was that the product looked good, but the aroma was not consumer compatible.

“Send us your trash – we’ll make it into cool products.” That's the simple premise and promise of New Jersey-based startup TerraCycle, a green recycler founded by two former Princeton University classmates who dreamed up the idea in 2001 for a business plan contest. Now full-time "eco-capitalists," they're making good business from trash by partnering with brands to create recycling campaigns for their products, and a halo effect for their affiliates.

Paul Smith wrote a series of articles about Terracyle <http://inspiredeconomist.com/2009/02/28/home-depot-and-petco-targeted-for-terracycles-newest-recycling-efforts/>  last year.  Founded by Tom Szaky and Jon Beyer in 2001 while students at Princeton, Terra Cycle <http://www.terracycle.net/bb/>  started as a way to spread the benefits of vermicomposting (that is, composting <http://kellibestoliver.greenoptions.com/wiki/composting>  with worms) to a larger audience. Szaky and Beyer were eventually able to earn startup funds, and by 2004, Home Depot <http://www.homedepot.com/>  was carrying Terra Cycle <http://www.terracycle.net/bb/>  Plant Food <http://www.terracycle.net/products.htm>  on their website.

If you happened to tune into the National Geographic Channel last evening between 8-11 pm, then you would have witnessed what many environmentally friendly individuals are calling the coolest, most innovative company to sprout up in a long time. The company, Terracycle, is a recycling company with a twist. TerraCycle, which was founded back in 2001 by a 19 year old Princeton University student named Tom Szaky works wonders with garbage. The company collects certain products such as potato chip bags, juice packs, gum packages, old cell phones, etc, and turns them into amazing products like recycling bins, coolers, fences, cork boards and more. They actually donate money to charity for people like you and I to send them certain pieces of trash. They even pay for the shipping and handling. Thus far they have collected an estimated 1.8 billion units of trash from over 10 million individuals, and have donated over $1.2 million to charities.