Spotlight: Lego's Sustainability Initiatives

Legos: these amazing toys can be a blank slate for building anything your imagination can dream up to providing nearly architectural schematics for the most intricate of collectable designs. They are popular for all ages and have been for many generations. This means there are billions of bricks, mini figures, and specialty pieces circulating out there, yet you can still spend an astronomical price on new sets. Some examples: the smallest kit, the size of a box of animal crackers, now starts at $15. A medium sized tub of Classic Legos (formerly known as Legos 😉 ) will contain a few hundred basic bricks and set you back at least $40. 

And then there are the specialty kits, ranging from famous buildings to Star Wars, which cost several hundreds of dollars.

Between the sheer cost of these tiny plastic pieces, and the existence of decades of previous sets, it just makes sense to clean and recirculate them. 

If you have Legos you want to get rid of:

DONATE through Lego Replay. You can print a pre-paid shipping label from Lego, who will forward them to organizations like "Teach For America" and "Boys and Girls Club of Boston". Don't forget to reuse a box for shipment! This is such a great option, because you know the toys will get to kids who will use them, vs. hoping they'll sell at a reuse store like Goodwill. They actually partner with Give Back Box to make this happen, which has programs for several other types of items as well. Through this program, they've already recirculated almost 600,000 pounds of Legos, benefiting 100,000 children.

SELL through any marketplace, such as eBay, Facebook marketplace, Craigslist, etc. They seem to sell for an average of $10/lb for bulk bricks and at a higher rate for small lots of specialty pieces or complete kits, so you could recoup some of your investment while making the pieces more affordable for those who purchase. 

If you have Legos you want to acquire:

 

BUY through any marketplace: For the same reasons as listed above, folks may be trying to recoup some costs, and you can benefit. For $10, you can definitely get started before investing in specialty kits, or you may just score that coveted collectible kit at a discount. In any case, you can save some $$, keep existing pieces from the landfill, and new pieces from being created from new plastic. 

 

BUY new plant-themed Legos: Lego is testing out new materials besides virgin petroleum-based plastic, and the first items they've made from their sugarcane-derived plastic are the plant-like pieces, cleverly named Plants from Plants. So starting adding more flora to round out your collection.

Launched in 2018, these trees and leafy pieces only represent 2% of the building blocks they offer, but are a first step to some of their longer term initiatives: 1) By 2025, they've committed to sustainable packaging, and 2) by 2030, they've committed to pieces made out of either renewal bio-plastics (like these sugarcane pieces) or post-consumer plastics, such as water bottles.

Kudos to Lego for taking these goals!

Do you or your kids have a Lego addiction? How much could you save or make by buying and selling used?

Conscious Travel with Carbon Offsets

After 15 1/2 months of COVID, I am *ready*. Ready to start returning to normal, which includes things like travel. We finally booked our first flight since this whole thing started (Vegas here we come!), and I couldn't be more excited. 

Now, air travel is pretty horrible from an environmental perspective, accounting for about 2.5% of CO2 emissions and 5% of global warming (due to other non-CO2 factors). While air travel is becoming more energy efficient, it can't keep up with increasing demand. Folks, this is horrible news! 

If you are able, train travel is a great alternative, especially if you live somewhere with high speed rail, like much of Europe. 

If trains aren't a viable option for you, consider carbon offsets. I was pleasantly surprised to see this option presented to me upon checkout with Alaska Airlines. For the low cost of $0.01 per mile ($17.32 for our trip), we can "pay back" our impact by contributing to projects that make a difference. 

What exactly are carbon offsets? Are we sure it's not just green-washing? There are multiple types of offsets, and multiple companies offering them. You will need to look at the particular company to see if it meets your priorities. For example, your funds could go towards planting trees, or R&D for alternative energy and technologies, or installing alternative energy devices, upgrading air travel itself, investing in carbon recapture devices, and more. 

This particular group, The Good Traveler, was founded by the San Diego International Airport in 2015, and partners with 20 other airports and airlines to offer offsets. They use your purchase to fund a variety of projects. Here are just a couple examples: HFC Reclaim is a project in Illinois to recapture and resell HFC refrigerants, prevented use of and emissions from virgin refrigerants. Ball State University has a project in Indiana to install a campus-wide closed loop heating and cooling system that upgrades them from coal. Massachusetts Tri-City Improved Forest Management project was able to protect 17000 acres of forest land. 

Pretty cool all the projects a small upgrade to your travel can fund. A small cost to mitigate the impacts of air travel.

A Different Type of Donation

Are you starting to think about spring cleaning? Have you been doing "spring cleaning" this whole time during quarantine and there are just bags piling up because you don't want to visit a thrift store with crowds and reduced hours? 

Or, are you avoiding thrift stores because I've already told you they're only able to sell a small portion of their overall donations? Or you have some items that aren't great condition?

There's a new service, for clothing and textile donation specifically, that will solve all of this: Retold Recycling. It works through prepaid mailers (convenience). Those prepaid mailers are made from compostable cornstarch (you won't add more plastic to the waste stream). They then sort through your items to find the best path to divert them into: thrift shop, charity shop, recycler, upcycler.

Because they do the sorting, you don't have to figure out: Is this thrift shop already over-saturated in jeans? How do I find a textile recycler for my hole-y socks? You can feel good knowing that Retold is making these informed decisions for you, preventing your items from ending up in the landfill. 

This service is "ish" cost neutral. You will pay up front for the pre-paid mailers. And if you do one of their recurring subscriptions, they give you rewards to spend with their feel-good brand partners (aka companies with like-minded good-for-the-planet goods). The bags average $15 up front and you receive $15 approximate value to spend with the partners. 

I'm curious what you think: Is this a recycling model you would be interested in trying?

Twelve Days of Conscious Christmas: Day 5, Donate to Your Community

It's ... another plug for Buy Nothing??  *Surprise!* :)

Dreading another year of gift-giving to your kids, because their playroom is already over-flowing? Now is a great time to clean through it. While many "adopt a family" or other holiday giving programs request brand new toys, your neighbors may be more open to gently used toys. 

Wrapping your presents, and finding you've accumulated too much wrap from prior sales? It's the perfect time to offload some to get down to a good amount. 

Have just a few cards leftover from various packs, and don't want to send repeats? Give the remainder. 3 cards from one pack, 2 from another... quickly adds up to a couple dozen cards, and the designs won't be repeats to someone else. 

Do you want to refresh your holiday decor? Post your prior decor for a person who's just setting up their first apartment on a budget. 

Have a ton on boxes from online shopping? Give them away! With COVID, more families than ever will be celebrating apart, and reusing boxes saves them on shipping. 

Here are just a few items that I've seen on my local Buy Nothing in just the last 2 weeks, that would make for quite the holiday celebration: 

• Several rolls of curling ribbon.
• Multiple artificial Christmas trees that just need some lights replaced.
• Some beautiful fabric and trim. One member had purchased for an art project and never got around to it. The recipient is making keepsake boxes for her daughters. 

• Assorted tree ornaments. 
• Assorted partial boxes of greeting cards. 
  

• Taper candles. 
• Children's books. 
• Jigsaw puzzles. 
• Holiday themed hand towels. 
• A glass cake stand. 
• Baby shark music wooden puzzle. 
• Bag of assorted Barbies. 
• Plastic outdoor playhouse.
  

Not on Facebook, so you can't do Buy Nothing groups? You can find other ways to connect to those in your neighborhood through sites like NextDoor or Freecycle.

Spring cleaning: not just for the spring anymore, and you may just make somebody's holiday brighter!

Cell phone ADDICT

I'm a middle-of-the-road cell phone addict. I don't have to have the latest greatest new model the day it's released, but I average about a phone a year anyway, never making it through my 2-year contract, because they make these devices so breakable and drown-able. I won't live without my smart phone either. It covers my phone, news, video game, music, online banking, and other needs, all in one tiny addicting package.

The problem with the phone-a-year culture? The devices are not only expensive, but also contain rare earth elements that contribute to mining-related environmental concerns and a foreign dependency on China. (Note: green technologies like electric cars use these same elements. Understanding the mining concerns makes a good case for closed-loop recycling.)

Unless regulations are changed, or cell phone providers incentivize returning phones when you are done with them, it's up to each of us to make the right choices when we get next year's phone.

Check out my sad collection: 4 phones that were sitting in my nightstand drawer after years of dropping, drowning, or otherwise killing them.

The good news is there are so many convenient options for moving your old phones on. For dead phones like mine, recycling is the answer. Your provider may offer recycling, and if not Best Buy does. Simply walk up to the customer service counter and they'll take them from you. The rare earth elements can then be reused for future devices.

While you're there, Best Buy also has recycling stations right at the front entrance. Do you have a collection of old jewel cases from back when we burned CDs instead of using flash drives? They can take them! Have a stash of old cables from older phones and devices? They can take those too! And... did you know used up gift cards can be recycled too? They typically aren't accepted in your home recycling can, so in the bin at Best Buy they go.

For working phones, keep one as a backup in case your new phone meets a horrible fate, but there's no need to hold on to more than one. Donate with your carrier or through a non-profit. Some use the actual phones, and some use the proceeds from recycling. Here are just a few:

• Cell Phones for Soldiers - your phones are sold to recyclers or refurbishers and the proceeds go to the troops for calling home
• Hope Line through Verizon - both phones and grants aid domestic violence survivors
• Secure the Call - provides 911-only phones to seniors and domestic violence survivors
• Eco-cell - recommended recycler by many zoos, due to mining impact on gorilla habitat
• Phones4Charity - choose your charity of choice to benefit from your donation

So, come on folks, this is your first spring cleaning task of the year: dig out your old phones that are just sitting in your desk drawer or closet, and drop 'em off at your local electronics store, cell phone carrier, women's shelter, or charity.

Spotlight: Give Back Box

Hi friends and followers!

I just learned about a great company through their partnership with Amazon, though they have many other partners.

Give Back Box is a company that facilitates donating to Goodwill, by providing free mailing labels so you can send in goods with any spare boxes you have lying around. They were founded in 2012 by Monika Wiela and Biz Debnath, who wanted to

"Give Every Cardboard Box A Second Life, Give Someone a Second Chance"

The idea is:

• your online shopping boxes get an additional use, and then recycled. 
• you save a trip on dropping off your goods at the local thrift shop during their open hours. 
• you can drop off the box with UPS or USPS or arrange for pickup. 
• the goods are received at Goodwill like any other donation. 
• you can still receive a tax receipt. 

 If you aren't nearby a Goodwill or work odd hours, this is a total win!

You can learn more about the new Amazon partnership here, or see a list of additional partners here. While these partners are helping promote the program, you can ultimately use any box, and aren't limited to the partner brands.

If you're anything like me, you've been doing a ton of holiday shopping online. So keep those boxes for Spring Cleaning, and let Give Back Box do the rest!