The bookstore I work for wastes A LOT of paper - How do I help change that & how do I get others to help?

Question

I work for a bookstore that doesn't recycle. And I don't mean just the paperwork in the store. Every week, a few times a week we get boxes of new magazines. When the new ones come in we take the old mags and tear the covers off to send back to the publishers (or whoever) and get $ back. A credit for what we didn't sell. The rest of the magazine however, gets trashed. To make myself clear, most of the time there is not just one or two old magazines left over. Try at least twenty. (At least) The same thing happens with the mass market size paperback books; every month we take the old ones off the shelf, rip the covers off, the company gets $ for the covers and more paper gets trashed. I want to help change this and I know it's not only the company I work for, but the publishers, as well as other companies. It would help so much if we found a way around this, and actually helped give back to our environment.. Spreading the word on what really happens is a start! How else can we help?

Answer 1

If you live in a sizeable city at all, there is probably a paper recycler there that you can sell the paper to.  Call them and find out what they require-- usually almost nothing, you just bring in the paper in a vehicle, they weigh the vehicle on the way in, unload the paper, weigh it on the way out; you get paid for the pounds of paper unloaded.  Once you're armed with this information, approach your boss and point out that there's another source of profit for your store.  No business owner is going to throw away money!  If that doesn't work, a couple of the other suggestions made are right on-- try to get a scout group, school, or local charity to start picking the paper up and recycling it for their group.  If none of that works, go to a do it yourself approach.  When you can, take home recyclable stuff and put it with your household recycling.  You might not be able to get it all, but every little bit helps! Good Luck on your efforts!

Answer 2

firstly you could ask the local boys scouts group if they want it as they often use paper to bundle and recycle as they get paid a little bit of money for this and it raises money for there group.

or you could write to the council that covers your area as im sure they willl have a recycle porgramme for businesses.

Answer 3

if you do any shipping from your store... id suggest getting an industrial sized shredder... shred all papers that would otherwise be trashed... and re-use them as packing material. or if that isnt a go... try looking up local paper making shops... bring the papers to them shredded so they can remake recycled paper out of it.

Answer 4

the only way is to make the process easy.  like put a recycle bin right next to the garbage can.

Answer 5

I understand your issue. I know Wal-mart does the same thing and it's sad.  Here are a couple suggestions:

1. As someone said earlier put a recycle bin next to the trash, or just an empty box and yo can pull out the ones you see. I used to do this when I worked next door to a book store. They would throw paperbacks away all the time that looked good, so I snagged them. Hey, once it's in the dumpster. :P My kid and my nieces loved getting new books for free.

2. Have the local school with one of those paper retriever dumpsters call your boss and explain how they use money raised from recycling paper. Let them lay the guilt trip.

3. Donate them to daycare centers to cut pictures out of them, or read them if suited for that age.  Same can go for nursing homes, maybe the people there could read them. It's just the cover missing.