New program aims to recycle food prep gear

Grocers who want to reduce waste in their stores can now recycle sanitary and safety equipment such as latex gloves and hairnets with the help of a little box.

The Zero Waste Box for Safety Equipment is from office supply retailer Grand & Toy and Terracycle, the New Jersey-based company known turning garbage into products.

Vanessa Farquharson, TerraCycle Canada’s communications manager, says the box is an environmentally friendly way to dispose of the nitrile and latex gloves, hairnets, dust masks and beard nets that accumulate in supermarkets’ food-prep areas.

Retailers can purchase a box (a 10”-x-10”-x-18” box is $84.75; an 11”x-11”x-40” box is $166.66) at grandandtoy.com/terracycle, fill it up and then call UPS for pickup. (Shipping’s included in the price)

When TerraCycle receives the box, it sorts and recycles the items, which are turned into plastic lumber used to make boardwalks, park benches and picnic tables.

“This recycling program helps grocery retailers conveniently divert more from landfill by recycling products that are considered waste by most municipalities,” said Grand & Toy’s sustainability manager Serguei Tchertok.

Founded in 2001 by then 20-year-old Princeton freshman Tom Szaky, TerraCycle says it aims to “recycle the unrecyclable” material that cities and waste haulers refuse to take (flimsy cookie wrappers and cigarette butts, for example).

Grand & Toy and TerraCycle already operate a few other Zero Waste Box programs together: for K-cups, office supplies and computer accessories. The Zero Waste Box for Safety Equipment started selling within days of its online debut.

“In essence,” said TerraCycle’s Farquharson of the program, “you can now protect your workers while protecting the planet.”