TerraCycle launches subscription-based pickup service

TerraCycle, Trenton, New Jersey, has launched TerraCycle Home as a subscription-based pickup service for more than 20 waste streams local recycling services won’t accept curbside.

Through the new program, consumers can subscribe to monthly or twice-monthly pickup service. The company then delivers customers Zero Waste Bags and an outdoor TerraCycle Home receptacle for easy recycling. Once customers fill a Zero Waste Bag, customers can schedule a pickup by scanning a QR code or logging into their TerraCycle Home accounts. Customers can put the Zero Waste Bags in their TerraCycle Home receptacles on the scheduled day of service, and TerraCycle will pick it up from their doorsteps for processing.

Materials accepted through the pickup service include a range of items that can’t be recycled in curbside recycling programs, such as cosmetic packaging, eyewear, personal protective equipment, pet food packaging, toys, plastic bottle caps, cigarette butts and various types of plastic packaging. The company offers a full list of accepted items online.

According to a news release from TerraCycle, the pickup service first launched in New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania. The company has plans to expand the service across the country.

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In New Jersey, TerraCycle Home services began in Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Morris, Somerset and Union counties. In Pennsylvania, the service is offered in Bucks, Chester, Delaware, Lancaster, Montgomery and Philadelphia counties.

The company says all materials collected through the program will be received by its material recovery partners, where materials will be sorted manually and then automatically into individual material components. Each material will be recycled into a raw format that can be used to make new products.

TerraCycle says a portion of the materials collected through the program will be recycled into benches and items that will be donated to local public parks in participating communities.

“At TerraCycle, we have always been committed to making recycling as easy and convenient as possible,” says Tom Szaky, founder and CEO of TerraCycle. “Through TerraCycle Home, we are happy to now offer doorstep recycling pickups for hard-to-recycle plastics and other items that do not belong in curbside recycling bins and help keep these items out of landfills and incinerators.”