This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil - What You Should Know About Waste Management with Jessica Gonzalez | 224

Episode Date: July 31, 2024

This episode is all about reshaping waste management in our lives and our communities, with a focus on changing the disposable culture we live in into one where reuse is the standard. Get ready to take some notes! Multi-faceted global CEO & Entrepreneur Jessica Gonzalez, joins us. She has a long history of building and scaling international startups from the ground up, most recently bringing her entrepreneurial spirit and expertise into the world of sustainable waste management as Founder and CEO of Happen Ventures. At Happen Ventures, she’s championing the cause of beneficial reuse, transforming waste into valuable resources, innovating cost-effective and eco-friendly solutions, and reducing landfill waste all while supporting local communities.  The time has come for action – for all of us to put our money where our mouth is. I don’t mean every single one of us going to zero waste – that’s perfection and as we know, perfection is an unattainable goal. But if all of us reused imperfectly, reduced even minimally, and recycled intentionally – we would ALL be better for it. And, as most things do, they start with YOU, and me, and us. Connect with Jessica: Website: www.happenventures.com  LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessbgonzalez/  YouTube: https://youtu.be/i3U-_ANP5jU?si=XB8l2cVx06fU2UWn  Like what you heard? Please rate and review

I am Nicole Kalil, and on this episode of This Is Woman's Work, we're going to cover a topic that we haven't before, but it's a long time coming. We've talked about time management, stress management, and financial management, but never waste management. And the reality, my friend, is we waste a lot of shit individually, locally, globally, in our lives, and in business. Most of us are incredibly wasteful. Think about it for a minute. How often do you throw away food that you didn't eat or products that you bought but barely used? How many items of clothing do you have in your

closet that you don't wear? How much time do you waste on social media or with people who drain you? How much money, water, or energy are wasted in a week in our homes? How much plastic and paper do we discard? How much shit are you personally contributing to our landfills? In full transparency, these questions are hard for me because I know I'm personally embarrassed about all the ways in which I'm wasteful. And it's not an inconsequential thing. Our wastefulness threatens our world's health and safety. It poses direct and indirect costs to society. It negatively impacts the environment and lowers the availability and quality of our resources. So let me say it another way. Reshaping our waste management on all levels is crucial

for the sustainability of our planet, our well-being, and our future generations. So today, we're going to talk about reshaping waste management in our lives and our communities with a focus on changing the disposable culture we live in into one where reuse is the standard. Get ready to take some notes, I will too, and let's dive in. Multifaceted global CEO and entrepreneur Jessica Gonzalez joins us today. She has a long history of building and scaling international startups from the ground up, most recently bringing her entrepreneurial spirit and expertise into the world of sustainable waste management as founder

and CEO of Happen Ventures. At Happen Ventures, she's championing the cause of beneficial reuse, transforming waste into valuable resources, innovating cost-effective and eco-friendly solutions, and reducing landfill waste, all while supporting local communities. This venture is a testament to her belief that with creativity and persistence, we can turn challenges into opportunities, not just for profit, but for the community and the planet. So Jessica, thank you for being our guest. And I want to start by asking you if you'd be willing to share a bit about, let's call it the traditional approach to waste management and why you feel it's outdated and no longer

working. So waste management and how we see it today. So traditionally, we throw everything into one bin and somebody comes to our front of our house, picks it up, and we don't have to think about it again. And this is something that a lot of businesses are doing as well. It's very inexpensive. Often it's free. More times than not, you have items that you want to give away, but there's just no easy opportunity for you to drop it off. You feel guilty, but you don't want these things to pile on. So traditional waste management has become a utility, kind of like your light. It's take items, throw them away, take the recyclables that we're used to, maybe 10% of that gets recycled,

and that's it. And I've seen in coming into this industry and world that there are just so many obvious solutions that no one's doing. And it's because you're just used to the way things are. And I said, screw it. I'm ready to kind of shake things up a little bit because the way things are doesn't necessarily mean it's the right way. I agree with you. I think this is the way it's always been done. And then also the added element of change feels hard,

even when it's sometimes not, it just, the approach can feel that way. So I know we've all heard about recycling, but what are some other transformations or additional approaches to waste management that we need to be aware of? Yes, absolutely. So recycling has been long held up as the gold standard. However, less than 15% of plastics and recyclables actually get recycled. The rest goes right to landfill. So we've been, I feel, greenwashed with the whole recycling term and allows us to feel better. Um, the other thing is it just becomes such a staple. You recycle plastics and you recycle landfill waste, and we're slowly moving into organics. Um, but most people don't even know what beneficial reuse is. And when they tie up reuse, they're thinking about maybe

donations, but then are they going to drive and keep that bag in the back of their trunk until they find that big little metal thing in the back of a supermarket to throw in their stuff? Or, you know, is there an easier way? In the EPA hierarchy, we have reduce, which is something that we want to put on our brands, reduce the packaging, reduce, put more circular solutions in place, and then reuse. And no one's thinking about it. And in the context of reusing and some just cool ideas that we're exploring is, you know, taking items that are just cheaper to landfill and from a retail perspective and putting it in a box and having a local nonprofit come and pick it up. And things that we were getting thrown out is mind blowing.

Lotions, shampoos, conditioners, outfits, health and beauty products, vitamins. All of these items were just being tossed because it's less expensive or it was being transferred as hazardous waste. And these are all consumer good items. And I think getting to reuse and understanding it first starts on a corporate level where the biggest impact could happen. And then on a municipal level, making it easy for us as people to have an outlet to bring the things we don't no longer need without having to post on Facebook and hope someone will come and pick it up. So we're in the process of trying to bridge that gap first in retail and businesses, and then moving that into municipalities to really start helping people at homes give items that are perfectly good.

They got a new couch. The old couch is fine. They just want to update it, a channel or a place where they can leave these items and they don't have to be thrown out. So I love the work that you're doing. And I can relate because it's sometimes not that the desire isn't there. It's the, I don't know where to take this or where to send this or where it belongs or who's going to use it. And so I'm fortunate in that we do have some relationships and some drop-off locations, but not for all of it. And that would be really incredible. So let's talk a little bit about the corporate side of that. What would that look like? You mentioned retail. I know in

preparation for our conversation, fast fashion, nonprofits. How does that look at that level? Before we even came into this industry, we stumbled upon a big issue. And that was the overproduction of PPE and all these COVID related products. Companies didn't know what to do with them. And it was very expensive to get rid of things that had chemicals. So traditionally, I'm like, you know, one man's trash is another man's treasure. We reuse things. We, you know, we don't want to throw them out, or at least we give them to somebody. But we're talking about truckloads, hundreds of this product. So we started with a few nonprofits and we're able to divert thousands of trucks of medical supplies that were literally hand

going to the landfill. It was insane and saved companies millions of dollars. In that process, we realized that the problem is so much deeper than an overspend of items. So, you know, people are no longer buying. We talked to all of our retail partners, our brand partners, and we realized that there on a store level are thousands of pounds of items that are being landfilled or processed as hazardous waste. So lotions, shampoos, brand new things that are like near expiration, they can't sell or things that, you know, were returned, but, you know, maybe there's a scratch on it, all being thrown outly good product. So from that, we created a retail level program that allows all the retail associates to,

as these products fit certain criteria, we don't want to give our partners or communities nonprofits trash, certain criteria, they put it in the box. Once the box is filled, they scan a QR code, alerts local nonprofit, and it's picked up within three days, saving the store money,

which is the key for a lot of businesses. You want to save money, helping them be more sustainable. So they're wasting, they would have thrown it out. There's a cost to that. And then helping communities get access to thousands of products without having to pay a dime. All they're doing is picking it up. So on a retail level, we're in thousands of retails doing this, diverting waste on scale. We're taking up to 80% of their hazardous waste and or landfill waste and diverting it to nonprofits who could use it. What pops into mind for me are restaurants and food waste. Does that play a part? Because what you're doing is incredible.

Now I'm starting to think, can it be done here? Can it be done? I'm sure you're already way ahead of me on that, but. Absolutely. And so there's a lot of really great programs right now and we are working. So there's great organizations that do food rescue. There's one that comes to mind, Good2Go,

which I have to shout out because I've used them before at the restaurant at the end of the day. You can buy a bag of items that they didn't sell so it doesn't get thrown out. Consumers could go get dinner for their family. So there's a lot of programs that are already there. We would take the non-food or support a food partner. And then we have the tech that handles all the logistics. So, hey, we have, you know, three pallets of food left over and we need it picked up within a day. That'll alert the

nonprofit instantly. Retail worker is easier. You know, don't have to worry about, you know, filling out paperwork. Nonprofit picks it up and boom. So we can make the connection on a grocer level with food on a restaurant level. I'm still trying to figure out. So the other piece of the restaurant thing that I do have to say is the reuse of actual to-go containers. I'm trying to solve that problem, not yet, but it's so wasteful to take a container, use it once, and then just go home and throw it out where, you know, if there was some of that happening where we could create a system to rewash things and not have to continuously to go bins, like get in the habit of that.

That's a mix of consumer changing behavior and also restaurant behavior and new systems. To me, that's the most wasteful. But yeah, we're trying to find solutions for that. That's our jam is how do we expand this on in as many markets as humanly possible and make it easy. That's the big thing. So it falls into the category of this seems like the right thing to do. And you mentioned most businesses are in business to do is profit, right? So you're saving businesses money. Is there a tax advantage to doing this as well? I would imagine there is. Absolutely. So yes, there's definitely a tax advantage to doing this as well? I would imagine there is.

Absolutely. So yes, there's definitely a tax advantage to it. You could write off the gross value through donations. Part of our program is we collect all the tax donation receipts, we collect the weights and everything in a nice backend. So it's easy to be able to take advantage of these programs. So tax is a big savings for all the companies. It's something even, you know, to consider on a just a personal level. You know, a lot of the items that you donate, you could use as tax write offs and get those items written off your taxes, which to me, I'm always a fan of. Yeah, we're all about saving tax dollars. OK, so you mentioned on a municipal level,

what does that look like? And does that get to us a little bit more as the individual, or is that a completely separate thing? So we're exploring ideas. It's very hard to get anybody to make change. everybody just the same processes. So we're, we're trying to pilot programs in more forward thinking areas. Um, how I envision it working on a municipal level is, uh, right now I don't know where I can take my stuff that is still good. I would go into like a Facebook page that says buy nothing, pay nothing and post it and put it outside and just take whatever you want. Um, just because I don't want to throw it out. Um, the goal or the key would be one, having a drop-off location, um, where you can bring items

that are still good under like a specific, you know, you don't want to take trash there, but you know, I have like three keyboards that still work well that I want to take. And now you have a centralized location where you can take these things. Then the nonprofits would go and they'd sort through and take the items that they would like. And then it gets sub-distributed and donated. Um, the great part about this is it's very little costs. You're not really paying anything. The municipality would only be paying, let's say for any software to run it. Um, the other piece would be, it's a long shot is to have a, you know, reuse pickup day, kind of like a pulp pickup day where you could put items that you want donated and, you know, getting a truck to go around and pick these up from everybody's house and being

able to give it to a centralized location where nonprofits could go and get all these items. I can't even tell you how many things I can look around my house right now and say, I would feel great about decluttering and moving this to somebody who can actually use it. Um, so those are different programs that I think would make it easier for people to, to give, um, one last program that I'm trying to hopefully get piloted would be the bag issue. We tried to do something really good with reusable bags. The intention was there, but no one thought about human behavior and having to remember to bring your bags back with you to the store. And in different states, they have a full ban where you can't get anything. So you're carrying that or you're buying another $2 bag. So one solution, just why I love this industry so much is like, okay, it's reusable. Let's get a drop off in at all of these stores, the Instacarts, the door dashes of the world could

come in the use a UBC light disinfect the bags, but you take a bag, you give a bag and like a true reuse location for these things. And again, very minimal cost, the cost of a box and the software to be able to scan it. And whenever it's filled, have a local food pantry come and pick up the excess. So right now what they're doing with these bags are they're trying to recycle them, which is super expensive. And it's like, why take something that is already built, truck it CO2 levels, and then bring it to a substation to recycle it, only take maybe 15% of it and then build a whole new product when you can just disinfect it or clean it and have the product be reused in the intended form multiple times over and over again. So things like that, it's just the human condition. You know, if I know there's a box somewhere where I could take all these bags and I have about 200 sitting under my

sink, I would be more inclined to do that because it pains me to have to throw them out. And these are things that a lot of people are just not thinking about. Just the common sense solution. It's like, hey, if I knew I could bring it there, I feel like most of us would. The older and obviously wiser that I get, the more concerned I've become about things that I never even thought about in my younger years. Things like the quality of my mattress and breathing clean air. I'm slightly obsessive about my air quality because air pollutants can cause all sorts of issues from itchy throat and sneezing to lung and heart disease. And did you know that we take about 20,000 breaths a day and Americans spend an average of 90% of their time indoors? Friends, I work from home, so I go literal days without leaving my house. And my favorite solution? Well, let me tell you about Air Doctor,

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That's airdoctorpro.com and use promo code TIWW. And now we head back to the show. So as you're talking, common sense was going through my brain. And I also had the thought of, you must feel really frustrated because these ideas are great. I think a lot of people would buy into them. They do feel very common sense. And I have to imagine there's a lot of red tape, a lot of, you know, this is the way we've always done it.

A lot of people who aren't open to change, like that's got to feel a little frustrating. I mean, maybe I'm projecting. Oh, no, girl. You know, it's like hurdle over hurdle. Um, so So it's it's frustrating when it's a male dominated industry. So it's just really hard to, you know, go in and change people's minds, you know, especially when they're the landfills or their job. They make money off putting more items in there and there's money in just doing how it was or how it used to be done. So it is frustrating. The light at the end of the tunnel and the secret sauce as to why I feel

we are now working with national brands and national retailers and people are answering our calls and we're just going to bat trying to scale this thing is because we're saving money. That is the key thing that opens people's eyes first, then the sustainability aspect. And then the part that eases my frustration is when I get these pictures and letters from all these nonprofits that they're like, thank you so much for this box, or there's 10 people fighting for one box. And you know, there's such a need there. So while I am frustrated, I see that we're getting so much more reception because we

solved the financial piece of it. And because of that, now all the sustainability folk can bring it up to their accounting department and get the clearance to run these programs. If it wasn't less expensive, we probably would take a long time. Which makes sense. I think there is an element in the work I do as well, where it can't just be, and I put in air quotes, the right thing to do, especially from my perspective. I have to always be mindful that everybody has a different version of what they think the right thing to do is, but it can't be just that for most businesses. At the end of the day, there has to be some business reason, which is usually a financial reason for them to be willing to change or do something uncomfortable or test something new. So if anybody's like me listening going, okay, how do I help? Where do I

support causes like this or get behind testing something like this or bring it to my municipality? What can we be doing? Great question. There's the I think the first thing is just knowing that this exists. Right. And that this is a viable option. There's not really that many options that include reuse and just have common sense approach of like, let's make it hyper localized. So just being on a platform like this and being able to talk about it so people know that it exists and they don't look at me cross-eyed when I say beneficial reuse is already a win. I think pushing your local townsfolk, council folk, congress folk to push on as many acts to allow for businesses to participate more in beneficial reuse.

For example, there's something called the Good Samaritan Act that's very limited to medical supplies and allows companies to donate expired medical supplies for the intent to help others instead of throwing it out. We need to expand that to more products so people could get access to these items because by liability, they don't want to donate it. So just keeping that conversation going, if retailers mentioning it, talking about it, sharing this concept

actually exists. And then I'll do the hard lifting. I'm going to start getting this in the grocers. You know, I'm going to get you a box program that will allow you to put all your bags in. You know, I'm doing the heavy lifting on the back to bring it to municipalities. And, you know, once it's there, just participate, participate, just, you know, put in the extra work of just dropping it off. And the great part about it is you're helping so many people. There are people who don't have access to these things. And, you know, that's, that's always the, the part that makes us so rewarding, even though it's so hard. Yeah. I, I'm glad you said that because I think that it's a very small,

easy, but wildly important way that we can participate, which is to participate early and often. Because when people test things out like this, they're looking for if it's being used, if it's being valued, if it makes a difference. And if we're sitting around going, I'll do that one day, or that's a great idea, but we're not participating via action that can negatively impact a really good idea and something that we actually really want. So. And one point, one other thing right now, you can donate items to other families in need. I think most towns have a buy nothing, pay nothing Facebook group. So if you have items, all you have to do is just take a picture of it and say, Hey, I'm leaving this in front of this address. First come first serve, get it. And I've, that's been super successful for me, you know, just because I don't want to throw things out and we

don't have a outlet now. So you can actually participate right away in these types of beneficial reuse functions to just help other families. So that was going to be my next question. So thank you for teeing that up along with these Facebook groups or, you know, community groups to be able to give away things for free. And there are some bins or local organizations that you can drop things off or they'll pick things up. What are your thoughts on, there are some brands or companies now where they'll basically buy back or you can bring back their products for reuse. So I think of like Eileen Fisher, they're bringing back their products. I am a huge fan. I believe if I'm not mistaken that ThredUp and Walmart have some sort of partnership where you can bring your clothes to resell them.

Huge fan, you know, especially with things like fast fashion where, you know, you've got three uses out of it before you get a hole in it. I think it's a genius idea to keep things circular and also give the opportunity for people who can't afford something for full price to be able to get nice products. You know, so I'm a huge fan, huge advocate. You know, if it's not, it doesn't have to be donated. It could be resold and that's still reuse. That's still more sustainable. That's still offering the product at a lesser cost to someone who might not be able to afford it. So huge fan. I hope that more companies and especially apparel retailers adopt that model where you could bring something back that's used and get a coupon to buy something new and then have a secondary market where people can have access to those items. Okay. So we talked about, we mentioned

recycle. We've talked a lot about reuse. What about reduce, which I think sometimes can be maybe the hardest pill to swallow, even though I think if all of us were being honest with ourselves, there are crap ton of ways that we could reduce the amount of waste that we're so what are some tips or tricks for people who want to start somewhere? Great question. Reducing. So I'll give you some things that I do, because it's just embedded in me now. When I go to pick up items, for example, I go and grab food. I'll just take the I'll leave the bag and say I don't need the bag. Or if I'm shopping, I'll leave a bag and just use one bag. I know it's hard because you don't always have a bag.

But like if I'm walking through the mall and getting items, then I don't need three different bags. Put it in one. So I'll say, you know, you could keep this. I don't need it or don't print a receipt. You know, at least just little things that you can do that don't are not inconvenient, that can help. Same thing with like, it pains me, you know, every time I'm a, I'm a mom. So Uber Eats is something that as a business woman, I need to do to feed my kids and have time to do everything. And it pains me that, you know, I can't just leave my Tupperware there and it's clean glass Tupperware and be able to just fill it up with stuff, bring it back. And, you know, the milkman style, um, like back in the day. Um, so, you know,

those, there's a lot of ways that it's hard just because the way things are set up to do that. I do now use things like Whole Foods where they have the different beans and the different granolas and I'll just refill my glass bins. But life doesn't make it easy. It's just unfortunate. Amazon boxes, you know, I don't need 50 of them. Just throw the item in the bin and like, I'll leave one in front of my house. There's just so many ways that other companies can help us. But as an individual, it's, it's a challenge because it's just convenient. It's all around us, but just little things like not having to take the bag or, um, you know, eating in a restaurant instead of just asking it to,

you know, to go or small things like that, they end up making a difference. Yeah. Just being purposeful. You know, my son now yells at me if I leave the water running while I'm brushing my teeth, you know, instilling in them that we want to protect these resources and just little, you know, things like that. Yeah. My daughter calls me out on lights that get left on and I'm like, I appreciate it. And like, Oh, it's a little annoying. My kids do the same thing. They're like mommy. And I'm like,

or like the water thing. They're, they're gonna, they're gonna be better than us. Totally. And they are good motivators, um, because they will pay attention and call out. And this is obvious. Well, I'll speak for myself. This is very much something I want to teach and pass down to my daughter and that I want to make better for the next generation. So having them be part of our mindfulness about it, I think can be really a good motivator. Thank you, Jessica. I know people are going to want to learn and be able to support more of what you're up to. So go to happenventures.com. We'll put it in show notes, but it's H-A-P-P-E-N-V-E-N-T-U-R-E-S. Or you can find Jessica Gonzalez on LinkedIn. Again,

we'll also put that in show notes. Jessica, thank you, thank you, thank you for the incredible work that you're doing. And I would love to encourage you. I know it's frustrating, but on behalf of all of us, thank you for leading the charge. And if we can be helpful, you know where to find us. Appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me, Nicole. My pleasure. All right. Here's the thing, friend. When we throw things away, it's not going away. It's going somewhere, most likely our landfills, which do not need any further contributions from us. And there are lots of catchphrases out there like go green, zero waste, there's no planet B, and green is the new black.

And I love the people who are out there championing these causes. But the time has come for us to get into action, for all of us to put our money where our mouth is. And I don't mean every single one of us going to zero waste. That's perfection. And as we know, perfection is an unattainable goal. But of all of us listening, reused imperfectly, reduced even minimally, and recycled intentionally, we would all be better for it. There is a New England proverb that says, use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.

And as most things do, they start with you and me and us. Reuse whenever and whatever you can. Waste less. This is woman's work.