Most business owners today would tell you the hardest part of their job right now is staying profitable. Especially small business owners who were hit particularly hard with COVID restrictions. Money is always tight when running a business, so it doesn’t hurt to look for new ways to save money. CleanRiver recycling solutions has over 30 years of experience working with companies helping them implement commercial and office recycling programs. Some of the most common questions we get include; “does recycling save a business money?” and “how does recycling help my business?”. If you have the same questions, you’re in luck! Here are the answers to those nagging questions.

How do companies save money by recycling?

The ideal method of saving money would be to reduce waste all together. Keeping that in mind, companies can save money reducing waste by doing any of the following:
  • Going paperless by limiting or eliminating the need to print, or fax documents.
  • Buying reusable products instead of single-use such as silverware and glassware
  • Saving cardboard boxes, shredded paper, and other recyclable materials for reuse (use the old boxes for storage, shredded paper for shipping padding, etc)
Purchasing single-use supplies is a big waste of money over time. Prioritizing commercial recycling can help you mitigate some of the costs associated with this. But to truly save your business money, commercial recycling should be a last resort, reducing waste altogether is the best way to avoid unnecessary costs. With that being said, there are still plenty of reasons to implement a recycling program. Commercial recycling can save your business money in many ways. The most obvious is by lowering hauling costs associated with trash disposal by diverting recyclable waste into the appropriate waste streams. This can be done by investing in commercial recycling bins that can help you maximize your recycling savings. how does recycling help my business How does that save money? Well, decreasing the amount of waste your company sends to the landfill… directly lowers the frequency of garbage pickups. The less often you have to send your waste hauler to pick up trash, the more money your company saves due to the smart implementation of commercial recycling bins.

How Does Recycling Help My Business?

How does a commercial recycling bin reduce trash pickups? The answer is a little less obvious. Office recycling programs tend to produce a lot more paper waste, commercial recycling programs tend to produce a lot more cardboard waste, and so on. By separating the recyclable waste like paper and cardboard instead of throwing it in with all the other garbage, you get 2 advantages:
  1. The recyclables are no longer filling up your garbage bags, lowering the frequency of trips to the dump
  2. The sorted recyclable waste can now be collected by recycling waste haulers and taken to recycling facilities
The average annual cost savings depends on how much waste your business generates, but it’s not uncommon to see savings anywhere between $3,000-$4000 per year just by simply recycling cardboard and paper. What’s the best thing to recycle for money? Well, scrap metal is the most profitable way to earn money back from recycling… although not all businesses can do this. Implementing a recycling program for your business can ultimately pay off in more ways than you would expect. To read more about recycling programs. Download our e-book on how to start a recycling program here.

Click the links below for more information about commercial recycling:

Office Recycling Program eBook 4 Steps to Help Start an Apartment Recycling Program What is Zero-Waste? 7 Tips on Achieving Zero-Waste in your Facility What to Recycle and What Not to Recycle bottom banner CleanRiver Recycling provides a variety of innovative, flexible, and customizable recycling solutions. Start saving money today with our green recycling programs. If you have additional questions that weren’t answered in this blog post please call us at 1-866-479-4038 or email solutions@cleanriver.com.