The Payoffs of Public Centers

More and more scrap processors are expanding their commercial and industrial operations to include public recycling centers. Five industry members tell how their new operations have been good for business, good for the community, and good fun.

They were gathering for the June 9 grand opening of Steiner-Liff's--and Nashville's--first full-service recycling center. They came for the special 50-cent-per-pound price for cans, for the good of Nashville, and for the contests, prizes, and free hot dogs, Pepsi, and snacks. Many Nashville scrap merchants had noticed a decline in business weeks before, hinting that customers were hoarding their recyclables for the day's event.

The overwhelming crowd prompted Steiner-Liff to open its gates at 7 a.m. rather than 8 a.m. as planned. Employees soon found themselves waist-deep in cans and surrounded by piles of other scrap. Workers had to direct traffic in shifts. The company had to open its iron scale to weigh the avalanche of cans, and employees scrambled in the blazing heat to find any empty truck. By the 4:30 p.m. closing time, the company had collected 3.2 million aluminum cans, dwarfing its goal of 1 million cans. "We were absolutely amazed by the response," says Noah Liff, Steiner-Liff’s chairman.

Call them what you will--buyback centers, public recycling centers, satellite operations, retail branches--more and more scrap companies are incorporating such facilities into their normal commercial and industrial operations. Their reasons vary. Some wish to provide a public service and glean positive publicity. Others want to support government recycling commitments. Still others desire to increase material supplies and protect their company's market share. The following profiles show how scrap industry members are approaching public recycling ventures.

An Educational Experience in Nashville

Steiner-Liff's trademark motto is "Recycling for the Future." Its $1 million recycling center, which adjoins its main facility in East Nashville, is designed with that in mind. The full-service operation includes a conveyor system and briquetters that can handle large volumes of aluminum and steel cans, plastics, glass, and various paper products. An average of 200 customers use the center each day, and Steiner-Liff pays for all items except newspaper.

In July, the company took in 325,000 pounds of recyclables, compared with 98,000 pounds in July 1989, an increase of 232 percent. The company launched the recycling center in conjunction with an agreement with Anheuser-Busch's Container Recovery Corporation, which will purchase all the aluminum cans collected. The local Anheuser-Busch distributor, Ajax Turner Co., is helping promote the new center.

"The center has cost us money, but we're already reaping benefits all the way around," says Skila Harris, assistant to the chairman. For one thing, the new center has proved to be a source of pride to company employees. In addition, she points out, "We're in the news all the time. Steiner-Liff's name is synonymous with recycling in Nashville."

In 1989, Steiner-Liff established a recycling hotline and hired a full-time recycling education coordinator, who lectures at schools and local gatherings, promoting recycling and the center. The company is always playing tour guide and recently hosted 165 Soviet exchange students, teaching them about the facility.

"You can't get into this without being devoted to education," Harris says. "You've got to get the information out or there will be misunderstanding. We've learned that there's no such thing as too much information." Customers often don't understand why the company can't accept certain materials, nor do they grasp the concept of product contamination. They can also be careless in mixing different recyclables.

Liff asserts, that "the people in Nashville are really ready to recycle."

Service Oriented in Napa

Three years ago, Judy Hensley knew no more about recycling than the average consumer. "All I knew was that I could get a penny for my cans," she says.

Now she is one of the principals, with her husband Jim and son Dwight, of Valley Recycling (Napa, Calif.), a certified California redemption center that handles aluminum beverage cans and other nonferrous metals, plastic bottles, glass containers, and corrugated and assorted office paper. The company's seven employees handle scrap from a steady stream of up to 300 customers a day, ranging from people in Cadillacs to peddlers pushing shopping carts.

In the fall of 1987, Hensley and her husband found themselves at loose ends in their early retirement. Napa had only one recyclables drop-off trailer where customers often had to wait in line. In reaction, the Hensleys decided to create a service-oriented buyback center. They rented two stalls in a storage facility, and Valley Recycling was born. Today the company occupies 15 stalls.

"It has been a terrific people experience," Hensley says. "The community has been so receptive to our being here. if you open up a new restaurant, people say 'So what?' But they're happy we're here."

The company enjoys high visibility in the Napa and Sonoma valleys thanks to its extensive promotion and outreach efforts. In addition to organizing recycling collection programs in schools and sponsoring Little League teams, Valley Recycling sets up booths at fairs, lectures local groups, supports the Special Games for the mentally handicapped, and offers tours of its facility ("Kids love the machinery," Hensley says). The company also participated in Napa's Transportation Day, in which commuters "paid" one can to ride the bus, with Valley Recycling paying the fares for each can collected. "Being participants in the community gives us visibility," Hensley notes. The company increased its recognition this year by winning a merit award from the California Department of Conservation for its beverage container recycling program.

Though Hensley and her staff enjoy working with the public, she wishes that customers were more aware of contamination, eliminating all foreign objects from their recyclables and separating their materials better--and in advance. However, she says, "the majority of customers are sensitive to our requirements for the separation and cleanliness of recyclables. "

"The community has responded beautifully, " she says. "They've heard the cries that we need to recycle. The public will come through. All we have to do is ask them. "

Working Together In Davenport

Pressure was building.

Last spring, the city of Davenport, Iowa, didn't have a single public recycling dropoff site. The state legislature had just mandated a 25-percent reduction in landfilled waste by 1994 and a 50-percent reduction by 2000. Earth Day had created a groundswell of support for recycling. Something needed to be done.

The city sent out a request for proposals, soliciting bids from more than 30 companies to handle specialized segments of the city's recyclables. Out of the 10 respondents, Alter Trading Corp. (Davenport, Iowa) was the only company that offered a comprehensive plan to handle all recyclables at one location. "Alter has been in business more than 90 years," says John Gentzkow, Alter's plant manager. "We prefer to be leaders in new recycling areas rather than ignore them." Davenport had found a solution and signed a one-year pilot program agreement with Alter.

The company set aside 1 acre of its main site, fenced the area, created a graveled drive-up loop for easy access, set up containers, and provided personnel to assist customers. All at no cost to the city.

The center accepts beverage and food cans, glass and plastic containers, and waste oil, with Midland Paper Co. (Moline, Ill.) picking up and processing paper products brought to the center. The center also provides a central location for citizens to drop off bulky waste (such as old furniture) and yard waste, which the city then picks up and disposes of properly. Citizens would otherwise have to pay $1.30 to $1.50 per bag of yard waste for curbside pickup.

Alter pays the city for the collected metal and batteries, but otherwise no payment is made for items and no collection fees are charged (except for a modest fee to recycle tires). "It is very much a cooperative effort," says Jeffrey Goldstein, Alter's vice president.

Approximately 300 cars pass through the drop-off site on an average day. In July, the program's first month, more than 73,000 pounds of recyclables were salvaged from the cities of Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa.

"The public is very grateful that the program is here," says Gentzkow. "They're concerned about the environment and are appreciative that the city and Alter have established this program."

The venture received much advance media coverage, and the city followed up with a mailing to its 42,000 households. The city also answers dozens of recycling-related calls a day and talks to many local service groups. "There's still confusion, " notes Mary McClain, Davenport's recycling coordinator. "People ask, 'Why do I have to do this?' You have to watch carefully to keep loads from being contaminated. But people want to do the right thing."

The pilot program will be up for review next July. "The city will most likely be anxious to continue," McClain predicts. "After all, it's not costing the city anything and Alter is doing an outstanding job. I like the people I work with there. They are very cooperative with the city. And it's a continuing surprise to work with the public.”

Community Service in Fort Worth

Imagine a second-grade girl touring a recycling center with her classmates. She listens to the guide describe the recycling process and watches the workers operate machinery. The tour captures her imagination so much that she brings her mother, father, and brother back for a tour. Only this time she gives the tour.

"She gives them an education," says Arnold Gachman, president of Gachman Metals Co. (Fort Worth, Texas) and first vice president of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (Washington, D.C.). "That's what makes it all worthwhile."

"It" is the company's year-old public buyback center, which Gachman calls "the closest thing to a full-service drop-off facility in the area."

The center, which occupies 1 acre of Gachman's main facility, accepts and pays for glass, beverage and food cans, and plastic containers. It features a covered drop-off area, staff help, restrooms, a waiting area, and a cashier. Diann Yanez, Gachman's recycling coordinator, describes it this way: clean, organized, quick, and friendly.

"We think of it as a recycling McDonald's," Gachman says. "You can drive in, drop off your scrap, and drive out." Gachman himself works at the center periodically during the week and on Saturdays, meeting customers, unloading recyclables, promoting the business, and making sure the floor gets swept four or five times. "You talk over stories with people, like 'Where did you get all those beer bottles?' It's fun. And we never fail to tell people about the other things we do. We try to give them an education."

Customers can receive cash for their items or opt to donate their scrap value to a number of local charities--such as the local zoo, the Wishful Wings program for terminally ill children, and the Fort Worth food bank--through Gachman. "Arnie likes to help the public," Yanez says. The center also works with schools, offers open houses and tours, mails fliers, and gleans TV and newspaper coverage. "The biggest and best advertising is word of mouth," Gachman says. "People will drive across town to bring their materials in. They are amazed to see a scrap operation."

Beyond the business sense of public recycling centers, Gachman sees his venture as a good way to get involved in the community. The rewards can be intangible as well as tangible. "It's a combination of good public relations, a strong civic commitment, and a learning process, " he says.

He points out one definite benefit: "We get 'thank you's' every day."

Branching out in Atlanta

Some people just don't want to go downtown.

Alan Cohen of Central Metals Co. (Atlanta) knows that convenience is important to people selling scrap. So he and company codirectors Martin Kogon and Mark Cohen decided to set up satellite centers in Atlanta's suburbs to make life easier for their customers-and to increase their market. "We perceived that, given the size of the city and its constant growth, if we didn't spread out, someone else would," Cohen says. The satellites also take some of the processing burden off Central's main facility in north-central Atlanta. "You can only run so many people through a central location in a day," he says.

Central Metals currently has "remote operations" in Marietta, Norcross, Forest Park, and south-central Atlanta, Georgia, all within 20 miles of downtown, and it plans to eventually have 6 to 8 centers ringing the city. The satellites, which bring in 10 percent of Central's business, may someday account for up to 25 percent. Central promoted the new centers through mailbox stuffers, windshield wiper fliers, newspaper stories, and above-market pay for cans. "There was a learning curve," Cohen says. "We've learned that success lies in having the proper location set up in the proper way, " meaning visible, convenient, fenced, efficient, clean, and properly staffed.

Central's satellites complement, rather than compete with, existing recycling dropoffs in Atlanta sponsored by local public-service groups. Though the company focused the satellites toward commercial scrap sources, it encourages citizens to use the facilities as well. Postconsumer materials are considered a plus. "We want their cans, we want their pots and pans," Cohen explains. "But we are more concerned about locating where there is an availability of commercial and industrial scrap.”

Branching out into the hinterlands required substantial management time and took six months to plan, but the effort has been worth it. After all, Cohen sums up, "That's where all the action is."

More and more scrap processors are expanding their commercial and industrial operations to include public recycling centers. Five industry members tell how their new operations have been good for business, good for the community, and good fun.

They were gathering for the June 9 grand opening of Steiner-Liff's--and Nashville's--first full-service recycling center. They came for the special 50-cent-per-pound price for cans, for the good of Nashville, and for the contests, prizes, and free hot dogs, Pepsi, and snacks. Many Nashville scrap merchants had noticed a decline in business weeks before, hinting that customers were hoarding their recyclables for the day's event.

The overwhelming crowd prompted Steiner-Liff to open its gates at 7 a.m. rather than 8 a.m. as planned. Employees soon found themselves waist-deep in cans and surrounded by piles of other scrap. Workers had to direct traffic in shifts. The company had to open its iron scale to weigh the avalanche of cans, and employees scrambled in the blazing heat to find any empty truck. By the 4:30 p.m. closing time, the company had collected 3.2 million aluminum cans, dwarfing its goal of 1 million cans. "We were absolutely amazed by the response," says Noah Liff, Steiner-Liff’s chairman.

Call them what you will--buyback centers, public recycling centers, satellite operations, retail branches--more and more scrap companies are incorporating such facilities into their normal commercial and industrial operations. Their reasons vary. Some wish to provide a public service and glean positive publicity. Others want to support government recycling commitments. Still others desire to increase material supplies and protect their company's market share. The following profiles show how scrap industry members are approaching public recycling ventures.

An Educational Experience in Nashville

Steiner-Liff's trademark motto is "Recycling for the Future." Its $1 million recycling center, which adjoins its main facility in East Nashville, is designed with that in mind. The full-service operation includes a conveyor system and briquetters that can handle large volumes of aluminum and steel cans, plastics, glass, and various paper products. An average of 200 customers use the center each day, and Steiner-Liff pays for all items except newspaper.

In July, the company took in 325,000 pounds of recyclables, compared with 98,000 pounds in July 1989, an increase of 232 percent. The company launched the recycling center in conjunction with an agreement with Anheuser-Busch's Container Recovery Corporation, which will purchase all the aluminum cans collected. The local Anheuser-Busch distributor, Ajax Turner Co., is helping promote the new center.

"The center has cost us money, but we're already reaping benefits all the way around," says Skila Harris, assistant to the chairman. For one thing, the new center has proved to be a source of pride to company employees. In addition, she points out, "We're in the news all the time. Steiner-Liff's name is synonymous with recycling in Nashville."

In 1989, Steiner-Liff established a recycling hotline and hired a full-time recycling education coordinator, who lectures at schools and local gatherings, promoting recycling and the center. The company is always playing tour guide and recently hosted 165 Soviet exchange students, teaching them about the facility.

"You can't get into this without being devoted to education," Harris says. "You've got to get the information out or there will be misunderstanding. We've learned that there's no such thing as too much information." Customers often don't understand why the company can't accept certain materials, nor do they grasp the concept of product contamination. They can also be careless in mixing different recyclables.

Liff asserts, that "the people in Nashville are really ready to recycle."

Service Oriented in Napa

Three years ago, Judy Hensley knew no more about recycling than the average consumer. "All I knew was that I could get a penny for my cans," she says.

Now she is one of the principals, with her husband Jim and son Dwight, of Valley Recycling (Napa, Calif.), a certified California redemption center that handles aluminum beverage cans and other nonferrous metals, plastic bottles, glass containers, and corrugated and assorted office paper. The company's seven employees handle scrap from a steady stream of up to 300 customers a day, ranging from people in Cadillacs to peddlers pushing shopping carts.

In the fall of 1987, Hensley and her husband found themselves at loose ends in their early retirement. Napa had only one recyclables drop-off trailer where customers often had to wait in line. In reaction, the Hensleys decided to create a service-oriented buyback center. They rented two stalls in a storage facility, and Valley Recycling was born. Today the company occupies 15 stalls.

"It has been a terrific people experience," Hensley says. "The community has been so receptive to our being here. if you open up a new restaurant, people say 'So what?' But they're happy we're here."

The company enjoys high visibility in the Napa and Sonoma valleys thanks to its extensive promotion and outreach efforts. In addition to organizing recycling collection programs in schools and sponsoring Little League teams, Valley Recycling sets up booths at fairs, lectures local groups, supports the Special Games for the mentally handicapped, and offers tours of its facility ("Kids love the machinery," Hensley says). The company also participated in Napa's Transportation Day, in which commuters "paid" one can to ride the bus, with Valley Recycling paying the fares for each can collected. "Being participants in the community gives us visibility," Hensley notes. The company increased its recognition this year by winning a merit award from the California Department of Conservation for its beverage container recycling program.

Though Hensley and her staff enjoy working with the public, she wishes that customers were more aware of contamination, eliminating all foreign objects from their recyclables and separating their materials better--and in advance. However, she says, "the majority of customers are sensitive to our requirements for the separation and cleanliness of recyclables. "

"The community has responded beautifully, " she says. "They've heard the cries that we need to recycle. The public will come through. All we have to do is ask them. "

Working Together In Davenport

Pressure was building.

Last spring, the city of Davenport, Iowa, didn't have a single public recycling dropoff site. The state legislature had just mandated a 25-percent reduction in landfilled waste by 1994 and a 50-percent reduction by 2000. Earth Day had created a groundswell of support for recycling. Something needed to be done.

The city sent out a request for proposals, soliciting bids from more than 30 companies to handle specialized segments of the city's recyclables. Out of the 10 respondents, Alter Trading Corp. (Davenport, Iowa) was the only company that offered a comprehensive plan to handle all recyclables at one location. "Alter has been in business more than 90 years," says John Gentzkow, Alter's plant manager. "We prefer to be leaders in new recycling areas rather than ignore them." Davenport had found a solution and signed a one-year pilot program agreement with Alter.

The company set aside 1 acre of its main site, fenced the area, created a graveled drive-up loop for easy access, set up containers, and provided personnel to assist customers. All at no cost to the city.

The center accepts beverage and food cans, glass and plastic containers, and waste oil, with Midland Paper Co. (Moline, Ill.) picking up and processing paper products brought to the center. The center also provides a central location for citizens to drop off bulky waste (such as old furniture) and yard waste, which the city then picks up and disposes of properly. Citizens would otherwise have to pay $1.30 to $1.50 per bag of yard waste for curbside pickup.

Alter pays the city for the collected metal and batteries, but otherwise no payment is made for items and no collection fees are charged (except for a modest fee to recycle tires). "It is very much a cooperative effort," says Jeffrey Goldstein, Alter's vice president.

Approximately 300 cars pass through the drop-off site on an average day. In July, the program's first month, more than 73,000 pounds of recyclables were salvaged from the cities of Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa.

"The public is very grateful that the program is here," says Gentzkow. "They're concerned about the environment and are appreciative that the city and Alter have established this program."

The venture received much advance media coverage, and the city followed up with a mailing to its 42,000 households. The city also answers dozens of recycling-related calls a day and talks to many local service groups. "There's still confusion, " notes Mary McClain, Davenport's recycling coordinator. "People ask, 'Why do I have to do this?' You have to watch carefully to keep loads from being contaminated. But people want to do the right thing."

The pilot program will be up for review next July. "The city will most likely be anxious to continue," McClain predicts. "After all, it's not costing the city anything and Alter is doing an outstanding job. I like the people I work with there. They are very cooperative with the city. And it's a continuing surprise to work with the public.”

Community Service in Fort Worth

Imagine a second-grade girl touring a recycling center with her classmates. She listens to the guide describe the recycling process and watches the workers operate machinery. The tour captures her imagination so much that she brings her mother, father, and brother back for a tour. Only this time she gives the tour.

"She gives them an education," says Arnold Gachman, president of Gachman Metals Co. (Fort Worth, Texas) and first vice president of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (Washington, D.C.). "That's what makes it all worthwhile."

"It" is the company's year-old public buyback center, which Gachman calls "the closest thing to a full-service drop-off facility in the area."

The center, which occupies 1 acre of Gachman's main facility, accepts and pays for glass, beverage and food cans, and plastic containers. It features a covered drop-off area, staff help, restrooms, a waiting area, and a cashier. Diann Yanez, Gachman's recycling coordinator, describes it this way: clean, organized, quick, and friendly.

"We think of it as a recycling McDonald's," Gachman says. "You can drive in, drop off your scrap, and drive out." Gachman himself works at the center periodically during the week and on Saturdays, meeting customers, unloading recyclables, promoting the business, and making sure the floor gets swept four or five times. "You talk over stories with people, like 'Where did you get all those beer bottles?' It's fun. And we never fail to tell people about the other things we do. We try to give them an education."

Customers can receive cash for their items or opt to donate their scrap value to a number of local charities--such as the local zoo, the Wishful Wings program for terminally ill children, and the Fort Worth food bank--through Gachman. "Arnie likes to help the public," Yanez says. The center also works with schools, offers open houses and tours, mails fliers, and gleans TV and newspaper coverage. "The biggest and best advertising is word of mouth," Gachman says. "People will drive across town to bring their materials in. They are amazed to see a scrap operation."

Beyond the business sense of public recycling centers, Gachman sees his venture as a good way to get involved in the community. The rewards can be intangible as well as tangible. "It's a combination of good public relations, a strong civic commitment, and a learning process, " he says.

He points out one definite benefit: "We get 'thank you's' every day."

Branching out in Atlanta

Some people just don't want to go downtown.

Alan Cohen of Central Metals Co. (Atlanta) knows that convenience is important to people selling scrap. So he and company codirectors Martin Kogon and Mark Cohen decided to set up satellite centers in Atlanta's suburbs to make life easier for their customers-and to increase their market. "We perceived that, given the size of the city and its constant growth, if we didn't spread out, someone else would," Cohen says. The satellites also take some of the processing burden off Central's main facility in north-central Atlanta. "You can only run so many people through a central location in a day," he says.

Central Metals currently has "remote operations" in Marietta, Norcross, Forest Park, and south-central Atlanta, Georgia, all within 20 miles of downtown, and it plans to eventually have 6 to 8 centers ringing the city. The satellites, which bring in 10 percent of Central's business, may someday account for up to 25 percent. Central promoted the new centers through mailbox stuffers, windshield wiper fliers, newspaper stories, and above-market pay for cans. "There was a learning curve," Cohen says. "We've learned that success lies in having the proper location set up in the proper way, " meaning visible, convenient, fenced, efficient, clean, and properly staffed.

Central's satellites complement, rather than compete with, existing recycling dropoffs in Atlanta sponsored by local public-service groups. Though the company focused the satellites toward commercial scrap sources, it encourages citizens to use the facilities as well. Postconsumer materials are considered a plus. "We want their cans, we want their pots and pans," Cohen explains. "But we are more concerned about locating where there is an availability of commercial and industrial scrap.”

Branching out into the hinterlands required substantial management time and took six months to plan, but the effort has been worth it. After all, Cohen sums up, "That's where all the action is."