Your Business is Our Business: Elegant Outdoors Mike and Susan migrated from London in 2002 in search of a new venture. Looking for a change in career and a fresh start, they stumbled across a business for sale on the corner of Rohini Street & the Pacific Highway, at Turramurra. With some much needed improvements and upgrades made in the early years, Elegant Outdoors started to take shape. Fast forward fourteen years and the successful garden centre affectionately known as “The Jewel in Turramurra’s Crown” is thriving in the hub of a supportive village community, where local residents have become loyal customers and in many cases, good friends. Mike and Susan have been banking with Turramurra Community Bank since 2004 (not long after the branch opened) and value the friendly service and likeminded community semblance provided to them. Offering a broad range of plants including flowering perennials, annuals, succulents, topiary, feature trees, indoor & hedging plants, Elegant Outdoors also sell a variety of decorative pots, water features, and garden art, along with all the gardening essentials like mulch and plant food. It’s not just the garden that this little gem caters for, with a gift and homewares shop located inside the centre aptly named “HOME with Elegant Outdoors.” Products change seasonally keeping things fresh and enticing for customers. Along with the large offering of plants and giftwares, Elegant Outdoors offer plastic plant pot recycling. Plastic pots can be dropped off at the garden centre, where they will then be taken to a recycling depot and eventually broken down and made into new pots! Every little bit helping reduce the input into landfill. Mike and Susan are proud of the industry awards they have won over the years, including; “Best Small Garden Centre in NSW & ACT” and “Best Small Garden Centre in Australia.” Susan attributes her successful business to having a great team working alongside her, upholding sound principles and ethics, offering exemplary customer service and maintaining a positive can-do attitude. Fast Fact: Did you know that Elegant Outdoors is a collection point for empty Nespresso pods? A great initiative by Nespresso, Terracycle and Elegant Outdoors, which typically sees 50kg of empty pods collected and saved from landfill each week!Pop in and say hi to Mike & Susan next time you walk past Elegant Outdoors, they would love to welcome you into their beautiful garden centre.

Securing the Outstanding Achievement in Packaging Stewardship prize at the 2016 Australian Packaging Covenant Awards, along with winning the Shipping and Transport category, was a reflection of the effort Australia Post has dedicated to its sustainability goals. It also has introduced a free mailing satchel collection program with Terracycle, providing a recycling solution for a product that cannot be dealt with by most councils’ kerbside collection services. “They are fantastic at their job, at keeping letters and parcels dry, clean, safe and secure,” says Andrew. “We’re looking for the most sustainable solution for the material, but while we’re doing that, we’ve put in place a free recycling program.” Australia Post customers simply register on the Terracycle website and once they have collected enough prepaid standard and padded mailing satchels, they can request a pre-paid shipping label. It also provides the returns process for the MobileMuster program through its network. It has provided 245,000 satchels to divert more than 62.6 tonnes of mobile phones and accessories from landfill since 2008. This postal return approach has been refined for a partnership with Nespresso, launched this past September, which is a particular source of pride for Andrew. Australia Post started conversations with Nespresso about two years ago about its challenge with its aluminium coffee capsules. They are recyclable but not through kerbside recycling bins as they retain coffee grounds. It needed an easy, convenient system for customers to collect those capsules and return to its recycling facility in NSW. It also needed to build on the collection program through 18 Nespresso shops and 300 florists, which it introduced in 2010. In an industry first, Australia Post designed a special mailing satchel for consumers to return their used Nespresso coffee capsules by post. This has enabled Nespresso customers across the country to recycle their used coffee capsules, as they return them by posting the satchel at any of Australia Post’s posting boxes or post offices, almost 20,000 lodgement points. Andrew cites the work Australia Post has done with Terracycle around cigarette butt recycling as a prime example. “We connected Terracycle with Clean Up Australia and equipped the huge number of volunteers on Clean Up Australia Day with cigarette butt recycling satchels as part of their kits,” he says. Waste Management Review_DecJan

Becoming a part of TerraCycle's recycling drop-off initiative was a no brainer for Hamilton-based Florist Ilene owner Marie Fowler.

Nespresso has partnered with Terracycle and Toll Couriers to improve the accessibility of the program. You can now drop off coffee pods at selected participating florists all around Australia.

A radio interview on Sydney radio station 2RRR about Earth Month and how to get involved with TerraCycle.

Calling all environmentalist...Are you a keen recycler? Do you wonder what to do with those hard-to-recycle materials like yoghurt pouches, coffee capsules and toothpaste tubes? Ahead of Earth Day later this month community members are being sought to sign up as recycling hubs to deal with just those items which would otherwise end up in landfill. TerraCycle, an eco-friendly recycling company that has become a global leader in recycling typically non-recyclable waste, is behind the scheme to grow the public drop-off network. The network comprises all kinds of locations, including schools, sports clubs, community centres, libraries, offices, and individual homes. The waste products are then recycled or upcycled rather than being incinerated or ending up in landfill. Items are shredded and turned into plastic pellets which can be used to make new items including playground equipment, fitness equipment and outdoor furniture. There are 233 active participants in North Canterbury for recycling programmes and about 18 drop-off points, most of which are florists collecting for the Nespresso Coffee Capsules Programme. As well as coffee capsules, other programmes available in New Zealand the Fonterra Pouch Recycling Programme, the GLAD Food Storage Recycling Programme and the Oral Care Recycling programme sponsored by Colgate. The programmes then give back to communities through a points scheme, raising money for a chosen school or not-for-profit organisation. Globally, TerraCycle works with more than 110 or the world's largest consumer goods brands to collect 75 different waste streams, including coffee capsules, toothbrushes, chewing gum and even cigarette waste. It operates in 20 countries and has over 60 million people participating globally in its programmes to collect waste and has diverted almost 5 billion units of waste from landfill and paid more than $15 million to charities and schools worldwide. To learn more about TerraCycle or get involved, visit terracycle.com Northern Outlook_Apr 11

Recycling is a win-win situation. Not only are you helping save the planet, but you’re also clearing the clutter out from your life. How do you know you’re doing it right? From bottle caps to aerosol cans, here’s a look at some of the things you may not think to recycle – but actually can. 7. Coffee pods Those single-serve coffee pods are notoriously wasteful. On average, Australians use one a week each. Do your bit to help by gathering those used pods in a plastic bag and dropping them at your nearest Nespresso store. 10. Makeup When was the last time you cleaned out that storage area under your sink? We shudder to think how many cracked, expired, half-used beauty products we’d find under there. Enter TerraCycle, who’ve teamed up with L’Oreal Australia to set up the Beauty Products Recycling Program. Simply fill a box, go online and download a shipping label, that way you can print and post it for free to the local recycling depot. Check out other Terracycle programs, including the Oral Care Recycling Program, allowing you to recycle used toothbrushes, toothpaste tubes and dental floss containers.

Recycling is a win-win situation. Not only are you helping save the planet, but you’re also clearing the clutter out from your life. How do you know you’re doing it right? From bottle caps to aerosol cans, here’s a look at some of the things you may not think to recycle – but actually can. 7. Coffee pods Those single-serve coffee pods are notoriously wasteful. On average, Australians use one a week each. Do your bit to help by gathering those used pods in a plastic bag and dropping them at your nearest Nespresso store. 10. Makeup When was the last time you cleaned out that storage area under your sink? We shudder to think how many cracked, expired, half-used beauty products we’d find under there. Enter TerraCycle, who’ve teamed up with L’Oreal Australia to set up the Beauty Products Recycling Program. Simply fill a box, go online and download a shipping label, that way you can print and post it for free to the local recycling depot. Check out other Terracycle programs, including the Oral Care Recycling Program, allowing you to recycle used toothbrushes, toothpaste tubes and dental floss containers.

The third most preferred option on the Waste Management Hierarchy is ‘Recycling’. Recycling involves the collection of waste materials and processing these into new products – therefore keeping these items out of landfill. For recycling to be effective we must know how to recycle properly. While recycling is great and we are lucky to have defined systems in place in Australia, we should still view this as the third option after we have exhausted any avoidance or reuse strategies. The recycling process of many items often uses less energy than starting the whole manufacturing process from virgin sources –  but it does still use energy – something we can save if we ‘avoid’ or ‘reuse’. For waste products you cannot reuse here are some tips on how you can recycle properly and effectively. There are even some items that you may not be aware can be recycled… 10 tips on how to recycle properly 4. Did you know that some coffee pods can be recycled? Nespresso and Nescafé dolce gusto both offer recycling schemes  – check out the details along with other recycling programmes you might not be aware of through Terracycle.

Have you ever found yourself facing your recycling bin, completely befuddled about whether or not you can put a particular item in it? You’re not alone. According to Planet Ark, nearly half of Australians find recycling confusing. The Conversation Australia’s recycling rules can seem horrendously complicated, but fortunately they are becoming more simple. What about things that can’t be recycled at home? Just because something can’t be recycled through kerbside collections, that doesn’t mean it can’t be recycled at all. New channels for recycling more complex items have been pioneered by organisations such as Planet Ark and TerraCycle, as well as by local councils, industry and government under schemes such as the Australian Packaging Covenant and the National Television and Computer Recycling Scheme. Free Terracycle recycling programs. Adapted from TerraCycle (http://www.terracycle.com.au) Recycling is vital to reducing resource use and waste to landfill, and so getting it right is crucial.