Holy smokes! You collect cigarette waste?!
When it comes to recycling at the Hub, there are a lot of surprising collections.
Customers delight in learning that we can recycle their empty toothpaste tubes, deodorant containers, corks, bread ties, plastic straws, and utensils. Then they discover we take even more unexpected items like Brita filters, Babybel cheese packaging including the wax and metal clip, unwearable socks, and empty sauce packets. And to even greater shock and awe, they learn we accept your dirty Swiffer pads for recycling.
When I started as Marketing Manager at the Hub, I found the amount and type of items we took both overwhelming and inspiring. One of my favorite parts of this position is spreading the news about all these weird and wild things that I never would have imagined are able to be recycled. Sure, some collections are just for a limited time, like at the end of last summer when we accepted pool floats. But a lot of our collections have had a place on our shelves for as long as we have been open. There are many moving parts in the recycling industry with innovations driving the way we handle our waste and it can be hard to keep up. The challenge to present to our customers all the things they can bring to us for recycling without completely overwhelming the public is a difficult one, but hopefully this new collection will be pretty straightforward and easier to manage as it is just one day a month.
Last month, we launched a new TerraCycle collection that is definitely the most surprising and one that I think will inspire many businesses and neighborhoods to visit the Hub.
On the final Thursday of each month, we will hold a special collection day for cigarette waste. This includes:
extinguished cigarettes
cigarette filters
loose tobacco pouches
outer plastic packaging
inner foil packaging
rolling paper
ash
Curious as to how TerraCycle processes this material? Check out this video about their plan for all your collected cigarette waste:
This collection poses a new opportunity for recycling items that are almost nearly always landfilled (when they aren’t just left littered on the ground). Here at the Hub, we want to encourage neighborhood councils, businesses, and restaurants to collect cigarette waste to bring to the Hub for recycling. This collection is the Final Thursday of each month and only that day as we will be sending it out immediately to TerraCycle and not collecting for weeks or months as we do with the plastics and other less odorous materials.
So make a plan for this month to collect dry cigarette waste. Gather it in a sturdy plastic bag or bucket and bring it to the Hub on Final Thursdays. See a volunteer at drop off for disposal in our special cigarette waste receptacle.
Note: It is imperative that the waste is all dry as we cannot accept any materials that are wet or damp for processing. If you do walks or collections throughout the month, store in a dry space until you can bring it to the Hub.
Happy Collecting!
