Keeping Good Stuff out of Landfills

I have a Winnie-the-Pooh cake pan I’ve been meaning to sell on ebay, but I promised my sister I’d let her use it before I sell it. This weekend she told me to go ahead and sell it because she got one off the website http://www.freecycle.org/. This company was founded by Deron Beal. He worked at a non-profit organization in Tucson AZ, which provided recycling services and transitional jobs to people in need. Instead of throwing away items, the organization called other non-profits in the area to see whether they could use the items. Deron thought there must be a better way for people to give and get items others were throwing away. He announced the freecycle network on May 1, 2003 by sending an email to 30 of Deron’s friends, and a couple nonprofits and those people spread the word of how to give and get free stuff others can no longer use. His little project has spread to over 75 different countries, and is keeping over 300 tons of items out of the landfill each DAY, as the nonprofit company approaches its five year anniversary. And since it’s a non-profit, any donations made to the freecycle network are tax deductible. Genius.