Big day on the road today!

So I do my e-scrap on the side. Pickups on my lunch hour, before or after work. Whatever it takes.



Went over to a school today, and did a pick up that took my entire lunch hour. I picked up:
20 desktop towers
20 laptops
16 LCD monitors
1 LCD projector
1 overhead projector
1 dj style cd player
2 network hubs
3ups units
And 5 laser printers

I got everything for free, but for schools I make a donation of $2 a pc to their school band boosters. I think i'll round it up on this load! Wow! I'm exhausted. Just got everything in the garage, but tomorrow I have to pull and catalog all of the drives for a certificate of destruction.

Congratulations. That's quite a haul. I'm fascinated by the networking part of this job -- the process of establishing your own niche sandwiched within the big fish (tuna)-medium fish (bass)-and small fish (guppy) E-cycling hierarchy.

I'm starting to think of E-waste production as a distribution with Big Gov. and Big Corp. comprising the peak of the distribution. So the real question for a potential E-waste entrepreneur/hobbyist is:
Is the E-waste in my region distributed normally or with a fat-tailed distribution -- and how fat is the waste stream tail composed of medium-to-small businesses/non-profits/local gov/individual households. Different regions of the country may have different E-waste distribution shapes, thereby creating different economies of scale for E-waste collectors/sellers. Small E-waste operators may work well in one region but not in others depending on the shape of the waste stream distribution. And there's of course a dynamic element to this since the E-waste distribution is probably always changing due to local competition and macroeconomic factors affecting local businesses.

Anyway, it's food for thought that I'm currently munching on.
Thanks for sharing the story thortek.
It really sounds like you've built a great local collection network for the scale of your operation.

That's very good of you to make the donation, not many people would do that. As a marching band member myself, I really appreciate your contribution to the band program at the school. Equipment is NOT cheap, and with all the budget cuts, they probably needed that.

nice load! No CRT monitors???

Originally Posted by Ewasted

nice load! No CRT monitors???

I picked up 2 along with two really old towers from a govdeal auction with the city. But those werenT included in that tally

Originally Posted by ElectricMetal

Congratulations. That's quite a haul. I'm fascinated by the networking part of this job -- the process of establishing your own niche sandwiched within the big fish (tuna)-medium fish (bass)-and small fish (guppy) E-cycling hierarchy.

I'm starting to think of E-waste production as a distribution with Big Gov. and Big Corp. comprising the peak of the distribution. So the real question for a potential E-waste entrepreneur/hobbyist is:
Is the E-waste in my region distributed normally or with a fat-tailed distribution -- and how fat is the waste stream tail composed of medium-to-small businesses/non-profits/local gov/individual households. Different regions of the country may have different E-waste distribution shapes, thereby creating different economies of scale for E-waste collectors/sellers. Small E-waste operators may work well in one region but not in others depending on the shape of the waste stream distribution. And there's of course a dynamic element to this since the E-waste distribution is probably always changing due to local competition and macroeconomic factors affecting local businesses.

Anyway, it's food for thought that I'm currently munching on.
Thanks for sharing the story thortek.
It really sounds like you've built a great local collection network for the scale of your operation.

I'm building my network. Thanks for e kudos! I've been using a lot of e,ail to get the job done. I now have some word of mouth too. I just need to get some $$$$ coming in to offset the costs. We live in a county of 115k people, so the stream is small, but I'm the only fish swimming towards the worms. I hope to get my name out there before anyone else catches on!

Originally Posted by CanIScrapIt

That's very good of you to make the donation, not many people would do that. As a marching band member myself, I really appreciate your contribution to the band program at the school. Equipment is NOT cheap, and with all the budget cuts, they probably needed that.

I allow the companies I pick up from to choose where I make a donation to as well. I was in band. It really afforded me a lot of opportunity, and made a lot of friends too.

Turn your monitors sideways please...LOL!

Turn your monitors sideways please...LOL!

I did! I flipped my flatscreen over and it fell off the desk; NOW WHAT???