My mother called me last night to tell me about an interesting notice on the side of her Wheat Thins box. Apparently Wheat Thins has teamed up with Terracycle to recyle their packages. My mother proceeded to tell me a bit more about it and then sent me a link to read through today. Here’s what I found in their “About Us” page: TerraCycle makes affordable, eco-friendly products from a wide range of different non-recyclable waste materials. With over 50 products available at major retailers like Walmart, Target, The Home Depot, OfficeMax, Petco and Whole Foods Market, TerraCycle is one of the fastest growing eco-friendly manufacturers in the world. Our hope is to eliminate the idea of waste by finding innovative, unique uses for materials others deem garbage. You can be a part of our eco-revolution, just sign up for one of our FREE Brigades or look for TerraCycle products at your local retailer.

With faculty making creative use of interoffice mail to band together for the environment, the staff at Scripps Research Institute is collecting their old wine corks to raise money for The Nature Conservancy. The organization gets 2 cents for each cork that the institute collects and returns to a company called TerraCycle, which makes affordable, eco-friendly products from packaging waste.

TerraCycle’s business model  follows the age-old refrain: one person’s trash is another’s treasure.  The company has collected millions of used bottles, cereal boxes and  packages, and has converted these materials into shopping bags,  backpacks, watches, and pencil pouches. In all, TerraCycle offers more  than 150 products to consumers via large retailers like Target,  Wal-Mart, OfficeMax, Whole Foods, and The Home Depot. In 2009, the  company reported $7.6 million in revenue and its projection for 2010 is  double that. Its number of employees also increased to 75 in 2009 from  50 in 2008.

Other companies' trash is Terracycle's treasure. Back in 2006, we  dubbed Terracycle the "coolest  little start-up in America <http://www.inc.com/magazine/20060701/coolest-startup.html?partner=newsletter_news> ." At the time, Terracycle was focused  almost exclusively on their core product, a garden fertilizer made from  composted worm poop, packaged in re-purposed soda bottles. Today the  company is still turning trash into new products, only on a much larger  scale. As the Wall  Street Journal <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703572504575214431306540058.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_smallbusiness>  reports, Terracycle has greatly expanded their  product line to include everything from backpacks made from reused drink  pouches to kites made from old candy wrappers. That expansion, however,  hasn't come without some difficulties. To house the mounds and mounds  of garbage they collect for their products, the company has had to lease  five new storage warehouses. Terracyle's execs have even begun sharing  offices and moving their desks into the hallways to make room for trash  piles. Terracyle is now banking on increased orders from big-box stores  like Wal-Mart <http://www.inc.com/topic/Wal-Mart+Stores+Inc.>  and Target <http://www.inc.com/topic/Target+Corporation>  to jumpstart their business and keep their  warehouses full of trash out of landfills. "The pressure is as high as I  can think of," says the company's founder, Tom Szaky <http://www.inc.com/topic/Tom+Szaky> .

Next time you purchase a box of Capri Sun drinks, a tube of Colgate toothpaste, a Clif bar etc.. consider hanging on to your trash and sending it to Terracycle! TerraCycle takes a wide range of different non-recyclable waste materials and then makes affordable, eco-friendly products. Terracycle is hoping to eliminate the idea of waste by finding innovative, unique uses for materials others deem garbage. With over 50 products available at major retailers like Walmart, Target, The Home Depot, OfficeMax, Petco and Whole Foods Market, TerraCycle is one of the fastest growing eco-friendly manufacturers in the world. Consider what happens when your kids finish drinking a Capri Sun…they toss the empty juice box in the trash which eventually ends up in a dumpster or landfill. Instead of adding the drink pouch to a pile of other pouches at the landfill, TerraCycle converts the used drink pouches into unique fashion bags, tote bags, pencil cases, and other items for kids and adults (check out the adorable Skittles bag below made from recycled Skittles wrappers)!

  Lee Elementary School students turned juice pouches into pencil cases, chip bags to lunch boxes and candy wrappers into backpacks as part of a national initiative that combines fundraising and recycling. Students collected nearly 6,000 pieces of non-recyclable waste, such as bags, wrappers and bottles, and shipped them to TerraCycle, a company that makes new products from lunchroom garbage. TerraCycle turns food packaging destined for the landfill into products for home, school and the office. The company’s tote bags, trash cans, picture frames and more are made from the waste and sold at major retailers like Target, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Home Depot.

Recycling in the workplace goes beyond a bin for unused paper and containers for aluminum cans and empty bottles of water. There are also pens, markers, tape dispensers and even cell phones that can be recycled. These items may not be the first things that come to mind when thinking of office recyclables, but they can definitely be put to good use at the end of their life. One company is working to take these types of products and upcycle them into new items: TerraCycle. TerraCycle works in a series of brigades. These brigades are designed to collect items that aren’t traditionally recycled and then upcycle them into new consumer goods. In addition to keeping these products out of landfills, the brigades also serve as fundraising tools for schools, churches and nonprofit organizations.