Getting the Bridgestone Americas Technical Center in Akron to be a zero-waste facility started in 2009. The company began simply by asking employees to recycle paper waste. The next step was a little more drastic.
“We took away individuals’ waste paper baskets so they would need to go to a general recycling area to dispose of their waste,” says George Schneider manager of building services and advanced tire workshop at Bridgestone. “We explained to all our teammates that this was the first step in reducing our waste and lowering costs, and we needed their help.”
To engender a response, the company focused heavily on communication through various media to educate employees on the initiative. But getting the results it wanted warranted a more thorough approach.
Smart Business spoke with Schneider about how the Bridgestone Americas Technical Center became a zero-waste facility in five years.
What was involved in getting the Technical Center to be a zero-waste facility?
As we moved toward zero waste, we had to identify all waste streams, which meant expanding the program across the entire campus — the test facility, data and research centers. We had to find out what everyone was throwing away and how much. A team was assembled to identify and quantify the waste streams, then find vendors that would handle each waste stream. We discovered that we could get credit from the vendors for some of the waste, which was a big incentive.
Once we had momentum, we communicated our progress and our goal to the entire campus through emails, posters, a monthly newsletter and videos to get everyone on board.
What challenges did you encounter in your sustainability plan and how did you move beyond them?
It wasn’t easy to identify all our waste streams, mainly because of the size of our company and the variety of waste.
We worked with vendors to measure the quantity of those waste streams, which we track monthly. We learned that there are a lot of items that vendors will collect at no cost and then recycle or reuse — they guarantee not to put it in a landfill. We found ways to group waste streams and their collection, and leveraged the volumes to get better pricing.
Our other challenge was changing teammates’ thinking. They were accustomed to using something and just throwing it away, essentially letting someone else take responsibility for it. When we formed the green team, they made an impact on that process using mass communication through different media to educate people on the impact they were having. They offered tips on how to achieve more desirable results and tried to make the new behavior of recycling fun and positive.
How have things changed for the Technical Center since meeting these goals?
We’re working to be responsible for our products and to achieve a high level of sustainability. It means finding ways we can use items or materials in our products that will be good to the environment, so more natural products and materials.
What impact does this accomplishment have on your business, your employees and the city?
One of our main goals is to be responsive to our community and the world we live in. We have a number of young employees who are starting families and we want to help create a better environment for their children and grandchildren. For Akron, I’d like to think we set a standard — just by our size and what we’ve achieved — that allows other companies to benefit from our knowledge.
What advice would you offer companies that are considering but have not yet begun their sustainability efforts?
Start now. Set small goals at first. Measure everything and communicate your results. Make it a positive experience. For instance, to celebrate our achievements, every Earth Day we have a big celebration. We bring in our vendors and they showcase the products they’ve created from our converted waste. We have games and food for people across the campus to thank them for their efforts while trying to further educate them on why we’re doing this and its impact.
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