Sustainability Business Spotlight: Ridwell

What inspired the launch of Ridwell?

Ridwell started as a carpool recycling service. Ryan Metzger, aware of the presence of chemicals in batteries, embarked on a research quest to find suitable disposal locations in Seattle. This proved challenging, as acceptance of batteries varied among locations. After realizing that many of his neighbors might also possess dead batteries, Ryan conceived the idea of a recycling carpool, where he could collect items from his neighbors along the way. Soon, his son Owen began identifying all sorts of different hard-to-recycle materials around the house.

On each occasion, Ryan and Owen informed their neighbors about their initiative, enabling them to contribute their belongings and prevent them from ending up in landfills. As the pickups became more substantial, news of their efforts spread beyond their immediate neighborhood. Soon, it had a name: Owen’s List.

The demand continued to escalate, leading Ryan and his family to recognize the potential presence of like-minded individuals who shared their vision for a sustainable future. Consequently, Ryan established Ridwell, a service which picks up reusable and hard-to-recycle items directly from your doorstep and brings them to partners who will give the items a new life.

What services does Ridwell offer the Edgewater community?

Ridwell makes it easy to waste less by offering bi-weekly pickups of reusable and hard-to-recycle materials right from your front porch.

When you become a Ridwell member, we give you reusable cloth bags for each category of item and a sturdy metal bin to keep them in. Every two weeks, simply click a button in the Ridwell app and our team will come by to pick up your bags right from your doorstep.

All the items are brought back to our warehouse in Denver, where they are sorted and distributed to partners for reuse and recycling.

Our core categories include plastic film, batteries, light bulbs, clothes, and as of last week, multi-layer plastic. Members can also choose from a menu of interchangeable categories that they can request one of for any pickup. Those include things like wine corks, bread tags, cords and cables, eyeglasses, and more.

Saving all of these items from the landfill is remarkable, but being able to recycle multi-layer plastic is especially exciting. Chip bags, granola bar wrappers and resealable frozen food bags are all examples of multi-layer plastic. To ensure freshness, it’s made with many layers of plastic and other materials.

Most recycling facilities are only equipped to sort and process one kind of plastic, so billions of these bags and wrappers end up in a landfill or incinerator instead, polluting our environment. Ridwell’s doorstop pickup service is a first-of-its-kind solution for recycling multi-layer plastic. We work with special recyclers who give multi-layer plastic a new life as eco pots, drainage solutions and construction-grade building blocks.

What makes Ridwell unique?

Ridwell offers a convenient and regular pickup service for various categories of items that are reusable or not easily recyclable through regular municipal recycling programs. Instead, we focus on collecting specific items like clothing, shoes, electronics, batteries, lightbulbs, plastic film, Styrofoam, multi-layer plastic, and more. Additionally, we work with carefully vetted partners to ensure that your stuff is going where it really belongs, out of landfills and given new life.

How can Edgewater residents learn more and start their Ridwell service?

Edgewater residents can visit get.ridwell.com/edgewater-echo to learn more and receive 10% off any new Ridwell membership.