Donation Vs Recycling ♻️ Podcast Ep. 24 Don’t Be A Waster

Donation Vs Recycling ♻️ Podcast Ep. 24 Don’t Be A Waster

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Transcript: Donation Vs Recycling

Donation Vs Recycling ♻️: Hello and welcome to another edition of our recycling podcast, Recycle: Don’t be a Waster! I suppose if you ask the question what is better than recycling, I suppose, just keep on using a product or service keep on using something so that you don’t even need to recycle it. And I suppose you know there’s a lot the longer you keep something the longer wearing it is the better quality the manufacturing it is likely to last longer and longer.

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But let’s be honest, humans change and everybody except me gets older, obviously. I just stay the same age but people get older and you know they grow out of things they grow out of lots of things that we consume and buy at certain times in our lives, And what got me thinking about this this week was we had a rubbish collection a hard rubbish collection and I was leaving out some items for collection and they couldn’t be recycled and some of the items were kids seats for a car seats and you might ask me the question why did I not give these to somebody else and the answer is I tried to I looked into it.

I offered them to someone I said would you like these seats and the answer they gave me was I can’t take those because they are expired and I didn’t actually I had to check the legislation on this but with kids seats there is an expiry date five years or whatever it is depending on the manufacturer and the argument is that because they’re in cars the sunlight will weaken the plastic decrease the safety etc. of the product, you know. And yeah, I can see that that makes some sense. Obviously, we’ll get into, I think, in a future podcast we might look at the planned obsolescence conspiracy theory for those recyclers who enjoy a good conspiracy theory, but it is you know, things do not last forever, and I suppose in this podcast we are going to look at a couple of it’s just, I suppose, a couple of simple options that people have for donating or giving away items that otherwise would end up in landfill, you know where can you give things that you don’t need but that might still have value to somebody else what options are available and I’ll be honest this market is not as big as it probably should be we all know, yeah.

Act 2: Donation Vs Recycling

There are certain ones that you’re probably aware of and a couple that maybe we’ll try to mention also that hopefully give you some options but like I suppose one of the things in in modern society is that items are not made to last this is you know things are often made to be replaced and this even harks back to my dad he used to fix electrical appliances washing machines items like that and he told me that after a while recently in the last 10 years fixing of a plant has just becomes a non-starter and the reason is they’re not made to be replaced they’re or not made to be fixed sorry items such as washing machines etc. if they break it’s almost impossible to take them apart it’s almost impossible to take the components out they’re not manufactured in that way so things are almost see it seems as if we’re designed to end up in landfill and with that it’s if things are broken it’s even is almost impossible to donate them but I suppose what we will do is we’ll run through some aspects but there are real you know holdups or handicaps to donating items whereby is the are people willing to accept them is are they have to be of certain quality control issues and these sort of things so when we run through the these options we’ll discuss some, you know.

I think the one that probably people are most aware of is that it’s the hard rubbish collection that is that you have in most cities in in Australia where people leave out furniture they don’t need etcetera on the side of the street and then people will go past to dry pass pick it up you’ll see people taking out aspects that are beneficial for them you know this is I suppose is that the least bad option whereby it’s the last step before it ends and ends up in landfill fundamentally.

So we’ll try to give people some options before that you know for high quality stuff for high quality plates cups you know anything really there’s the options of the charity shops whereby you can donate them to salvation army, St Vincent de Paul, the Smith Family as well who do collections. And these organizations – basically, their model, really, is they take items from what the people don’t require and then they will sell them for charitable purposes.

You will often see like at the doors people the signs of saying “please do not leave rubbish”, “please do not leave stuff outside”. And I suppose fundamentally what happens is what one person thinks can be sold or given away is often not what in reality can be sold, and these stores tend to really only want high quality good quality products and the same really equivalent to second-hand stores or vintage stores for clothing.

Act 3: Donation Vs Recycling

They tend to only want stuff that theoretically can be sold anybody who saw the met gala recently might have saw I think Kim Kardashian was wearing a shawl that Marilyn Monroe had in the back in the 60s valued at five million dollars and you know I think people in the modern times they are only prepared to wear or buy or use items that are almost as good as new or if not as good as new have some sort of vintage element so I really think your ability to donate stuff that is not of the top quality in this aspect is quite low but I suppose those the first steps I would like to know from people like Vinnie’s and the salvation army and the smith family who have collection points like what percentage of items donated because obviously you’ll see the donation bins for clothing it’s a bit different because that clothing can be used for rags etc.

But you know people leaving bags against the signs up on the walls people leaving stuff outside the stores at night in theory it is illegal dumping really you’re just trying to get rid of your rubbish in many regards without you know paying for it so that that really is the stores options the next option we have is stuff such as we have the collection bins where and again I think of the smith family who have collection bins and many you know shopping precincts throughout Australia where it’s more clothing aspect and with clothing you know there are it can be used if it can’t be re-worn it can of course be used as rags used for filling.

And there are other opportunities for using it so that is one to one to consider obviously aspects such as when we get into clothing probably from my recent reading the most developed area is in the aspects of running shoes sports shoes and that sort of aspect whereby there are charities available most of them sponsored by the big manufacturers, you know, the Nikes the assets the Adidas whereby you can donate shoes busy for charity whereby some of them will be re-reupholstered.

Act 4: Donation Vs Recycling

I don’t know if that’s the correct word or re-cobbled or you know improved and then given to kids either in Australia who are needy or overseas and there are organizations such as souls for souls that’s so less for souls a bit of a word player there so that’s one option and I was even recently in the sports store platypus recently and they had they did have other options as well for shoe donations there’s a one company called shoes for planet earth dot com are worth checking out and of course souls for souls who we’ve mentioned and you will also see collection points in the one I saw in was platypus.

But I believe you’ll see them in other stores also such as rebel sports but unfortunately these only apply really to the sport shoes at the moment other shoes such as dress shoes leather shoes there’s very limited opportunities for giving these things away and I think this is a real area where I think organization would come in you know an organization charitable it’s almost like an aftermarket required for these sort of items that there probably are smaller more regional areas for it but I think it’s something that could very easily attach on to a planet arc or even a city council website whereby there’s donation swap opportunities for this huge volume of stuff that’s, that, that people are giving away that other people might want, you know – second-hand furniture aspects like that that fundamentally the council will end up paying for the municipal organization will pay for through disposal so it would make a lot of financial sense as well as environmental you know charitable sense to create that market.

One aspect we’re trying to do on some of these recent podcasts is give a shout out to people who we’re aware of and in this in this sector there’s a company called or organization called bootsforall.org a u and boots for all dot org dot a u and they’re part of an organization called sports for all and they have a and their website their boostforall.com.au where they discuss how their football boots for the different types of football that people play kids boys and girls and you can donate boots to them and they will be used or provided to kids in need who can’t afford to go and buy a great a new pair of boots so again that’s a that’s a great initiative and we’d like to promote that, you know, I think with football especially for kids when you’re growing through.

You know, football seasons can be short and when by the time the next football season rolls around you know a kid is going to grow in those boots you know six months later so sometimes the boots that you’re buying are top quality and they’re not being worn maybe more than probably 10 or 15 times they’re probably still in excellent quality and are perfectly suitable for donations so I’d like to recommend that one to people of course anyone else has anything they’d like to any websites any organizations that like to promote feel free to reach out to us we’ll always give a shout out and mention also in the show notes to any organizations you know that I think our listeners will be interested in hearing about so yeah reach out to us okay so have a great weekend and remember, Recycle: Don’t be a Waster!

Editor’s note: Leave a comment if you have any questions about donation vs recycling.