Happy Earth Day! At Elisabethan, we try to live every day like it’s Earth Day and we wanted to tell you about items you probably didn’t even know you could recycle. Not only that, we wanted to teach you HOW to recycle these items.
1. Athletic Shoes
There are plenty of organizations that take athletic shoe donations. MORE accepts gently worn shoes. The shoes are then sold in major metro areas to vendors who in turn create jobs and help improve the quality of life in cities. The proceeds from the sale of the shoes provides training and tools to the poorest rural farmers. Soles4Souls is another organization that takes shoe donations. Their mission is to create sustainable jobs and provide relief through the distribution of shoes and clothing around the world.
2. Holiday Lights
Those holiday lights sure look pretty but they don’t last forever – what should you do with them once they finally kick the dust? Donate them to HolidayLEDS, who recycles your lights and even sends you a 15% off coupon.
3. Bras
Yes, we said bras, you can recycle bras! The Bra Recyclers is leading bra recycling company that has partnered with Ambassadors around the world to recycle over 1 million bras and support over 80 non profit organizations. Their purpose is to ignite a ‘Bra-volution’ to decrease the number of bras entering our landfills, while providing substantial social benefits to women and girls in need.
4. Batteries
Batteries contain heavy metals which can poison the soil and water in landfills. You’re able to recycle batteries by mail with BatterySolutions. Or stop at stores such as Ikea and Staples which have recycling programs for batteries and other items like ink cartridges and more.
5. Eyeglasses
In just about any home, one can find a pair of eyeglasses that are no longer being used. That same pair of eyeglasses can change another person’s life. Lions Club accepts donations of glasses of all types. These glasses are then cleaned, sorted and distributed to people in need in low and middle income communities where they will have the greatest impact.
6. Greeting Cards
Everyone loves getting a greeting card and St. Jude’s Ranch for Children has made them eco-friendly. St. Jude’s Ranch for Children recycles your used greeting cards and creates new holiday and all-occasion greeting cards. Recycled cards are sold to support our programs and services for abused, neglected and homeless children, young adults and families.
7. Keys
Each year In the United States alone, millions of keys become lost or obsolete and are then thrown away. The Key For Hope Foundation is a non-profit organization that collects such keys are weighed and sold recycling centers as scrap metal. The profits are used to fill the food pantries and help the hungry. It doesn’t have to stop at keys! Other metals that can be scrapped can be donated as well, such as lock systems, copper, and all other metal items.
8. Sporting Equipment
Kids outgrow sporting goods so quickly it’s hard to keep up. There are various places that accept sporting equipment and put it back out into the athletic world, one of which is Play It Again Sports. In fact, Play It Again Sports will buy or trade equipment with you.
9. Packaging Materials
Packaging materials are often necessary but once they’ve done their job they seem like a waste. Well waste no more! There are various ways to recycle packaging materials the Plastic Loose Fill Council and the EPS Industry Alliance are great resources to find recycling locations. Another option is to reach out to small business owners to see if they could reuse your packing peanuts.
10. Crayons
The National Crayon Recycle Program takes unwanted, rejected, broken crayons to a better place, where they will be recycled into new crayons! This “recycling” education, community service has made it possible to stop more than 112,000 pounds of unwanted crayons from going into landfills with the help from schools, organization educators and kids across this country.
