Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Jessica and Rodrigo from Garbage Day: Toronto Mike'd #682

Episode Date: July 8, 2020

Mike chats with Jessica Yeung and Rodrigo Fernandez from Garbage Day about RBC Ventures, Garbage Day, and more before kicking out trash can jams.

Welcome to episode 682 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Palma Pasta, enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Garbage Day. Weekly reminders for garbage, recycling and yard waste pickup. Visit GarbageDay.com slash Toronto Mike to sign up now. StickerU.com. Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos and decals for your home and your business the Keitner Group they love helping buyers find their dream

home text torontomike to 59559 and we welcome back our friends from Pumpkins After Dark I'm Mike from torontomike.com and joining me this week are Rodrigo Fernandez

and Jessica Young from Garbage Day welcome guys hello, hello, hello, thank you for having us thanks for being here, I want to give a big congrats off the top by Rodrigo, I big congrats off the top by Rodrigo. I understand congrats are in order. Yes, thank you. Fourth child has been born.

Her name is Mariana. Brave soul. Okay. Are these close in age? Like, not that I need all the specifics, but... They are. They're about two years apart. So seven, four, four and a half, almost five, two, and then newborn.

Because when you first said they're two years apart, my brain thought all four happened in the same two year period. And I was thinking, I hope there's like triplets in there or something like that. So, OK, I got to give you a big congrats there because I'm the father of four children myself. I'm in that club. But I have like teenagers and then I have like little kids, like a six-year-old and a four-year-old. So I have a nice gap there. But what you're doing takes a lot of courage. Well, you know, I wouldn't say courage.

I would just say it's just a ton of fun and a lot of, it's work. But you know what? Where, you know, one is work, two is a lot of work, but then three and four. Stop counting. It's just sort of, yeah. Now, Jessica, we're reaching you today. You're in Toronto. Yeah.

So your experience. Born and raised. Born and raised. So my so yeah me too uh now what like you don't obviously you don't have to give out your home address here Jessica but what kind of what neighborhood were you kind of raised in if you don't mind me asking I'd say like North York okay North York any part of Toronto Mel Lastman Square that's here that's all I have when it comes to North York references. And Rodrigo, we talked briefly before I pressed record. You're not in Toronto.

Where are you speaking to us from? No, I am broadcasting all the way from Kitchener, Ontario. There's a community radio station that broadcasts The Lost Indie City, which is from Pete Fowler. And I would throw out those call letters right now, but I can't remember them.

But check in my T-shirt to see if I'm wearing a Lost Indie City shirt, but I'm not. But so shout out to the community station that plays the great jams in Kitchener-Waterloo area.

One of the things that I do know is that Kitchener was one of the first cities in Canada to actually bring out a curbside pickup option for garbage and recycling. Fun fact. No, at 7 p.m. yesterday. And I learned it was not yard waste pickup day, which is too bad. I had a bunch of yard waste I had to put up. But I learned it was recycling and perishables.

And got it out. And I will say I eat my own dog food, as they say. I thoroughly enjoy my weekly reminders from Garbage Day. So it's fantastic. And if I haven't said so yet, maybe I should let people know. Who am I talking to about Garbage Day? Let's start with you, Jessica. How are you involved with this fantastic Garbage Day app that I use?

Yeah, so I guess I was one of the co-founders. It started off on like a casual conversation, a sticky note, and then it kind of blew up from there. We were looking at solving sort of homeowner problems, right? Like as you own a home, there's like a bazillion things that just you have to take care of. And we thought, okay, let's try to solve some of them. And we took the simplest one and start with that. And let's go from there. Do you have an app that will clean my eavesdrop? I need an app that will do that. Can you do that? I have an app that can get you a discount to an eavesdrop cleaner. We'll name drop it and then we'll dive deeper.

But what is the app that will give me a discount on a cleaner there? GarbageDay.com slash toronto mic of course and then with some perks to shakshine who does eavesdrop cleaning okay see okay we're gonna learn a lot this episode now uh i'm just gonna let the periscope viewers know that if the four-year-old and six-year-old are seen they will not be heard right guys because daddy's recording right all right awesome i see that it's a hot day and i want to talk to you about this that's why i was setting the table by saying you know jessica's in toronto and uh and you you're uh rodrigo you're in kitchener but uh is it like like like can we talk about this heat just for a little bit here yes this is this is hot right like this is relentless heat for early July. It's gorgeous.

This is great. See, I don't mind. Okay, there's a variety of people. That's what makes life interesting. But some people hate this heat. I personally, I just did a quick bike ride between episodes. And I actually, I love it. Like, I actually love the heat. But a lot of people are uncomfortable in this heat.

So you don't mind it. It's such a small window that we get this. Soak it in. I love it. And it's way better than those like minus 20 days in February or whatever. Absolutely. And especially for me coming from an eternal summer, that's Miami in Florida. You know, this feels like home. This definitely feels like home. especially for me coming from an eternal summer, that's Miami in Florida.

This feels like home. This definitely feels like home. Minus the salty air, right? Right. If you have salty air, that's another problem, I think. We've got to discuss that. All right. So how long ago, Rodrigo, did you move to Canada from Miami?

10 years ago. And while Jessica's developing this app, what are you doing riding the coattails? What is your role with the Garbage Day app? Something like that. My role is growth. So I make sure that we get Garbage Day into the hands of as many people as possible throughout Canada. I got you. So Jessica does the heavy lifting, you know, the dev work and then you're sort of... I have all the fun.

Yeah, I do the marketing, the design, the graphics, the, you know, that's, yeah. I just get to pitch the story and make sure we get funding to stay alive. And then we have an awesome tech team that really does the heavy lifting.

Oh, I got you. Okay, so when you mentioned you were a co-founder, like how many people on, I'm curious how the sausage is made, so to speak. So how many people on the Garbage Day dev team? Yeah, so today we're a lean team of two developers. And then we kind of share a tester that kind of makes sure all the code looks good and checks out

too okay and then again rodrigo here to uh to ride the coattails of those doing the hard the hard work there why did you move here from miami uh miami sounds like a i don't know it sounds like if you could have this heat all the time why would you leave that oh it's a long story it's a long story but essentially uh my wife lived here. And it was just so much easier for me to move to Canada than to deal with U.S. immigration and all that good stuff. Plus, Canadians were just naturally friendlier. So I said, you know what? I'm moving to Canada.

I'll take your word for it. I don't know if I'm allowed to have an opinion on that. I'm a little biased. You know, you said it's a long story. but then you started by saying your wife is from here. And really, that's a short story. No, no. My wife is not natively from here. My wife immigrated from Colombia.

So I'm originally from Venezuela. So it's an immigration story told over a couple of volumes, which I think we can discuss over a couple of beers. And I don't mind even sharing it in another episode. Okay, as long as it's over some Great Lakes beer, we can do that. There you go. Some Great Lakes beer. Absolutely. All right. So let me ask, do you have any family still in Florida? I do. Yeah. My mother, an older sister, and a nephew are in Florida, in Miami. May I ask how they're doing? I mean, I see the news. Yeah. They're stuck at home. I mean, most of Miami is out. They're out of the news. Yeah, they're stuck at home. I mean, you know, most of Miami is out. They're out of the beach.

They're having a great time getting sick. But no, my family is indoors. My mother's already, you know, a bit older. She's in her 70s. And so she's definitely taking care of herself. Okay, good, good. As long as everybody's healthy. But it feels like, I feel like, and I could be off base here,

but it feels like in Canada, we put health and safety first and then economy and fun second if you will but it feels like it's reverse in the united states it feels like priority one is like economy the number two is having a good time and then health and safety comes uh third i could be wrong this is my political message of the day yeah i mean i think era you're into right which year who's who's running the country at the moment we won't get too political no but i think it's very intrinsic from for americans to always feel and wanting to be independent right so you can't yeah it sort of goes back to like you know the tea party right it's like exactly it's like you can't tax me like you know you get out of you know it's like you can't tell me what you can't tell me to

wear a mask you can't take away my firearms there's a lot of that going on but you're right we canadians we love to apologize for everything right so you know sorry for wearing a mask sorry for taking the mask off right it's just and i'm sorry that we do that. Sorry. That's right. Sorry. Sorry for apologizing. So we're all okay with the heat. I did hear today on CBC Radio this morning, they were saying that there's been more days over 30 degrees so far in 2020 than we had in all of 2019. Wow. And it's early July.

Like the hottest months are July and August. So it's been hot. And they said last night night like last night while we well most of us slept uh it never got below 23 degrees wow which apparently is really hot so uh yeah i don't know because i'm always sleeping but anyway apparently it's really hot now um can i ask how you guys are you guys uh garbage day like how did you guys adapt to the social distancing order when it came down in march like like how did that guys adapt to the social distancing order when it came down in march like like how did that go yeah so we went from we all work in an office downtown

uh down by queenskey and we all saw each other every day interacted every day face to face um and then it was on that thursday when you got that announcement that schools were closed. And we're like, oh, this is serious. So we all scrambled. We decided to all work remote. So they made the call for everyone to work remote. And so we did. We love Zoom. We used it so much.

And Slack. But we've adapted. And I think it's actually made us a bit better and closer because we interact so much. Are you going to go back to the office when we get that vaccine? We don't know. I think we're actually totally sufficient 100% remote. But it is nice to have those social interactions or the hallway conversations or the coffees in person. And we might still do that.

like the hallway conversations or the coffees in person. And we might still do that. But you know, as everyone else that's trying to figure out what the right thing to do is, we're gonna learn as we go. I absolutely love working from home. So I look so we have been homeschooling for the past year. So we were, you know, ready for we were ready for for the home remote. But I just love the fact that my kids see me working, and that I have direct access to my kid. I'm not spending, you know, an hour or two hours commuting every day. And I mean, you're right. I mean, you're in Kitchener. So, of course, you love working from home.

It's a lot of time commuting. Like, that's tough. But you were just taking the go, I guess. Yeah, well, I actually moved to Kitchener a week before the lockdown. I was actually in Durham, in Whitby. And so we moved just to be closer to family because all my wife's family is here in Kitchener. Okay. And so we moved and then boom, lockdown.

I never got the opportunity to take my two-hour commute down to Toronto via the, you know, what is the train? The train, the GO train. The the train. The train, the GO train. The GO train. That's gone right now, obviously, but that was prime podcast listening time. That's right. I do miss that.

A lot of people, some people, believe it or not, some people drive to work and back. Can you believe it? But people do seem to miss, that's the one thing that seems to be lost, that kind of quiet time alone with your podcasts or your music. For me, the hour that I had on the train was what I call my moment of zen. I just loved that intimate time to myself. So let's talk to people as if they haven't been listening to Toronto Mic for the past few months.

Because if they are listening to Toronto Mic, which let's face it, most of them are, but if they are listening to Toronto Mic regularly, they're quite familiar with Garbage Day at this point. But for the record, what is Garbage Day? Yeah, it's a super simple reminder service for your home. We help end the gas work, whether it's garbage recycling or special collection day each week.

And then we throw in some perks because we have a larger vision that's beyond just Garbage Day. It's around helping people, give them perks, making the eco-friendly choice easier. And that's it. Go ahead, Rodrigo. Yeah, and I would add, you know, one of the reasons why we made Garbage Day, aside from the fact that, you know, we were trying to solve a home problem,

is that, you know, we realized that we Canadians, we have a very, a big problem with garbage. So if you think about it, we're generating 10 million metric tons of garbage of waste per year. That's just residential. Right. If you add commercial waste,

it adds up to 24 metric tons. But the challenge here is that we're actually generating seven percent more per capita per person than the u.s yeah i never would have guessed that so we are you know canada is like you know huge the biggest generator of waste in the world right yeah and like if you bring that down to the individual person. Each person creates an average of five pounds of waste a day, a day, a day in a single day.

I don't know. I don't, maybe this is, maybe I'm a more, you know, sensitive to this. I think if you think about now is everybody works from home, everybody's,

you know, eating and ordering takeout, like everything is in your home. And now you have extra garbage that you're putting out there that you weren't before. Yeah. And the other thing, too, with the problem with is the recycling aspect of it. So I don't know if you're aware, but Canada used to export a lot of its recyclable materials out to places like China, for example. Oh, I know this because my wife was telling me that the Philippines refused a shipment or something. Yeah, well, the Philippines, Hong Kong, but China is,

so it used to be our biggest importer or exporter. You know, the exporter. Recipient or whatever. Yeah, but what happened is they've realized, they wrote a new policy two years ago where they're now denying almost 65% of our recyclables just because they're contaminated. And the challenge with the contamination is that we're recycling poorly. We're contaminating our recycling.

So, for example, if you order a pizza and the pizza box is soiled you can't recycle it anymore i've i've i think uh so i can't remember now who to credit for this but they call it wish cycling like canadians we throw things in the recycling and we we sort of cross our fingers and hope it's recyclable that that is exactly it right like so this is what we're trying to solve is like how do we make it easier how do we bring you that information without trying to like you know sort of push it on you like it's a lot of people want to do better but it's not easy so like how do we make that easier step by step you know this ties this is a nice companion podcast episode to uh something i'm doing next friday with dr diane sacks who was the Environment Commissioner for Ontario.

And she has a podcast called Green Economy Heroes, where every week she talks to like a, basically a business in Canada that is, she calls them Green Economy Heroes, but they're basically, their efforts are helping with our climate emergency. That's amazing. Yeah, and Dr. Diane Sachs of SAXE. I wrote that down. Yeah, Sachs. So we won't get too political here. But she was, when the Liberals were in charge of our province here, she was appointed the Environment Commissioner, and she was doing great work.

And then the Liberals lost the election to the Progressive Conservatives, and they weren't very progressive, because the first thing they did was get rid of our environment commissioners. So, yeah, I'm going to have some real talk with Diane on next Friday. And that's very interesting, this whole messaging that you have going on here. Yeah, like one of the things we also do is we try to connect these eco-friendly brands to households. So a lot of eco-friendly brands, you know, it's hard for them to get their name out there. And so what we do is try to connect people to them.

And a lot of people aren't aware of these brands. And so that's sort of like a little part that we're playing and trying to connect the two. Okay. So if I'm, so basically if, you know, somebody right now hasn't done so yet and they go to uh garbageday.com slash toronto mike and and i mean i've done this it's very it's easy to sign up and there's like i guess you got like a a trifecta of ways you can be alerted like you can get the sms text like the text on your phone you can get the email i get both of them by the way and you can get uh there's an app there's even uh an app so you got sort of the three options or whatever. And so in this message, and you talked about, I know you mentioned, Jessica, like, of course,

what do I bring to the curb on this Tuesday morning? Is it recycling? Is it garbage? Is it the yard waste? Is it the Christmas tree? But also, you know, there's also that whole like curveball when it comes to curbside collection, like statutory holidays i had everything picked up on canada day and i actually didn't think they were going to pick it up canada day but my uh garbage day notification said they were and i

trust you guys so much i put it out and yeah garbage got picked up at my house on canada day and that's one of the things right so before garbage day if you imagine it's like it the street relies on whoever's the first to bring out the before garbage day if you imagine it's like it the street relies on whoever's the first to bring out the bin you're right you can see exactly on like those stat holidays where it shifts for some cities yes if that first person is wrong the whole street is wrong and so it's almost funny because then you know like people are just watching their neighbor and and air i saw air filter replacement uh like there's something that you get alerted to as well uh just take it you're just basically taking the guesswork out of it all

as you mentioned a lot of these things are kind of user demand generated right so we talk to our users all the time like you know what what do you need to be reminded of what interests you what are some perks that you're interested in one of the ones that came up was hey I didn't realize I needed to change my filter every three to six months right and so yeah remind me right and then what we also do is we then also connect you to a brand that sells air filter subscriptions for example and then that way it's easy right you don't have to remember then you have to go out and buy you got to remember what size we save all that information for you and then and then it shows up at your door right so like it's beautiful simple and easy and that's kind of how like that's our philosophy okay now before i get get to the real talk uh i do i do want to know like if you have a a roadmap or for like, what's next for garbage day?

Like, like, is there, are you, are you able to speak to what might be next for the service? Yeah. So, you know, our, our larger vision is to be able to connect more eco-friendly brands to households and why that's so huge and important to us because it, it plays to our larger vision, which is, if you think about like small incremental changes earlier in the life cycle and consumer spending, you can

sort of make shifts, larger consumer shifts, right? So if I start slowly purchasing things more eco-friendly, I can make a larger impact over time through the masses, right? So if we started at 10,000 people making those changes, that's great. But if I then grow to 100,000, then a million, like think about how many dollars and behavior that we're shifting to help towards eco-friendly brands and, you know, just bettering the environment. And how you're supporting the economy by supporting the smaller companies as well, who are also really the ones hiring, you know, and making the progress. Yeah. You really do need to listen to Dr. Diane Sachs' Green Economy Heroes. Honestly, what a great fit connecting you guys.

Yeah. Anyway, and also listen to Dr. Diane Sachs on Toronto Mike next Friday, too. The Tyler actually wanted me to know if Garbage Day can add GPS for the trucks. He thinks it'd be cool if there was somehow you can know where the truck is. The garbage truck. I'd love to be able to do that. So I know Toronto has like Plow TAO or something like that where they track the snow plows. Yes.

There's an app like that. Love would love to do that. We just need to convince the city of Toronto to let us do that. No, no, no. It's easier to get forgiveness than to ask permission. You just walk by the garbage truck and you put the GPS thing like underneath it or something. There you go. Like in the movies.

We'll hire a bunch of raccoons to do the work for us. Last night, so I recorded in the backyard yesterday. If anyone on this Zoom here is a wrestling fan, you don't want to miss the episode yesterday, all about wrestling with the guys from post-wrestling. But I had an extension. So my guest in the backyard studio, Milan, needed to plug in his laptop.

So I had an extension cord. And then late last night, I went outside to bring it in because it could rain, and it actually did a little rain last night. But the cutest, three of the cutest little raccoons were out here, and I have a tree in the

middle of my backyard I'm pointing to that you can't see. But, I don't know, you mentioned the raccoons, and they were just, and all i could think about is like okay there's a few these cute baby raccoons like mama is somewhere and i don't want her to think i'm uh endangering her babies like i was like i was just like so scared like she was gonna come out of nowhere and just claw my face off or something this is anyway this is this is yesterday and uh you said raccoon so okay real talk go ahead no i was gonna say raccoon is a huge toronto or really any urban center issue right and that's kind of why you know you see raccoons in some of our website illustrations there's a reason

for that it's because this is why getting the your garbage out at the right time is important because if you don't you're to have a raccoon problem. And so, like, to me, that illustration reminds me of, like, I got to get this right because it could go really, really wrong. Well, when you're done this chat with me, you'll see that we were live on Periscope and I did put that raccoon logo. And I did put that raccoon logo. By the way, I've also heard that the raccoons are downloading Garbage Day to figure out when to also go outside and hunt for some garbage. On that note, obviously their preference is the perishable bin. And we have the new bin.

We've had them for a few years now. But the new bins with the new locks. By all accounts, are they working? Have these new locks on the the green perishable food bins uh fooled these genius raccoons we have in toronto i've seen i don't know have you seen those youtube videos where people have captured raccoons with their opposable thumbs like turning the knob and getting them open knocking them over they get in they what is it in the jurassic park uh nature finds a way is that always there's a will there's a way oh that's funny uh let's let's do a little real talk here because it sounds like when i'm listening to you talk

uh it sounds like there's this you know ecological uh angle and small business angle. And it helps us homeowners in this, you know, the big smoke here. And there's a lot of great things about the Garbage Day app. But I did a little research and I see that you're owned by RBC. And I have to ask the question, which is why is RBC this this this big Canadian bank why are they in the garbage business yeah we we can totally speak to that and I mean like so really technically we're owned by uh we're owned by RBC Ventures and then RBC Ventures is owned by RBC the bank um and so what RBC Ventures is is we're essentially like an incubator or an innovation hub where we kind of bring folks either from the bank or from different walks of life with diverse backgrounds

to work on innovative solutions in people's day-to-day lives and so we're we we have a whole bunch of different ventures as well that look at different areas of people's lives but like for us my focus originally was home homeowner um and you know me being being a homeowner like definitely there's no shortage of pain points whether it's like home maintenance renos if you've ever done reno you know how how painful that can be uh or even buying a home like you know what to buy with toronto prices now i mean you you i'm sure you know and you're probably glad if you if you own your home that you own it now i bought this house seven years ago and i could not afford it today yeah seven years ago like nine years ago i bought

this one and there's no way i could afford it today that's why rodrigo's in kitchener yeah correct exactly all right wait so so two things jump out at me there uh so you mentioned like uh this hub uh incubation hub i can't remember how you described it jessica but you it's a rbc ventures an offset of rbc yeah obviously uh garbage day is not the only app coming out of RBC Ventures. So just so I can visualize it in my head, is there like, you mentioned the team at Garbage Day, you mentioned the two developers, like, is there like 10 of those pods all producing different apps? Yeah, we have a ton of ventures, which are all focused on different areas. And they're doing an amazing amount of work. So for example, we have Arrive. Arrive is one of our

ventures. And they provide tools and resources for immigrants who are coming into work into Canada. And so it's basically more of a networking hub that allows them to come in and network with other immigrants who are coming into work. They get mentorship and they get help, which is amazing. Find jobs. Yeah, and to find jobs as well. During this time, it's quite difficult. That's cool. Did you want to shout out another app at RBC Ventures you're proud of?

Yeah, for sure. We got tons. We got tons. We got tons. And why aren't they all sponsoring Toronto Mic'd? We should have them all. We're the guinea pigs, you know? If this goes well, we're set. Or you're the canary in the coal mine.

Is that the deal? That's right. So if today we get 10,000 subscribers from the podcast, we will flood Toronto Mike. GarbageDay.com slash Toronto Mike. All the FOTMs should go en masse and do it and get your loved ones to do it too. Okay, so back to the RBC Ventures.

You want to shout out another one that you're proud of? I would say Smart Reno. Right now, they're looking to disrupt the renovation industry. So if you've ever done a reno, you know that there are a lot of trust issues or quality issues or just who to find that you know you can trust, whether it be pricing or whatnot. And so they essentially are this marketplace where you submit a quote on a project, you get access to their network of contractors that give you three quotes back um and they've vetted these contractors for you so you don't have to do that um and then you choose you have the power of choice of which of those quotes that you want to go with and then away

where you go i got a buddy chris emmanuel who i i believe uh you know he, he's involved somehow in getting gigs through SmartReno. And he's great. He's fantastic. Amazing. Amazing. Now, another skeptical question, because, you know, by default, I'm cynical. And then you gain my trust here. But so RBC Ventures has these fantastic apps that are very helpful.

I mean, I've been using one for months now, and I love it. And I'm just curious, is this all to, like, is the end game for you in addition to helping mother earth? Is it to, uh, sell me bank products from RBC? Like, uh, I know there's been articles about, uh, about this, uh, online. Is there anything you can speak to that? Yeah. I mean, I can take that. I mean, like, so I don't know why, but it's always like a big evil bank. Well, by default, people don't trust banks. I think there's a default setting there, I feel, even though it might not be warranted. But it's kind of weird because we have all our money in our bank, in the bank. We trust it or not trust it. You're right. No, seriously, though, like I know, you know, if anything, I think banks are even more sort of careful with data than probably a lot of other companies are. And so, I mean, I don't know if you heard about like the Tim Hortons recent thing about their app.

I did. Location data. location data like so you know i can tell you just from experience there's no way we would ever be allowed to do that because we're so careful with data you make a good point yeah like like if if anyone's gonna you know incented to be ultra like secure with your data it's a bank like there there's so many things we have to check, like before we launch anything. Right. And so it's like, if, if somebody is going to have your back on data and security, like it's going to be somebody that's gone through that sort of bank level rigor.

And I know we're not technically like the bank products, but, you know, we're still sort of held accountable to that level of scrutiny. And so, you know, we're super careful with that even when we build our products today like we only take what is needed for us to provide you the service that you need right so if you look at garbage day you take your address and that's pretty obviously why so we know when your collection schedule is right or you know your email or number so we can text you or email you, right? Or, you know, your email or number so we can text you or email you the messages that you need for the reminders, right?

And so anything we collect, I can tell you, we have to write a report on why we're doing it, how long we're keeping it, when we get rid of it. Like, so it's quite thorough and we're very careful of that. There's really, like, there's no other play. Like, it's not even legal for us to sell data. Like, we wouldn't even want to do that, right?

And I think, and to add to that, I think it's important to, from an innovation perspective, right? If you think of the financial ecosystem, right? Most Canadian banks in Canada, they're basically focused right now on the digital transformation, right? Because, you know, most of these banks have like very old or cake systems, right? That, you know, they're very rigid, right? And now they're trying to digitize everything to make it easier for people to bank through their mobile apps, right? Now, RBC is doing that as well. But what I found really compelling about RBC, and not just because I'm an RBC employee, is, you know, it's like, oh, I haven't

been trained to say this. But what I found really compelling is that RBC is really focused on going beyond banking, connecting with consumers beyond financial products, right? Because, and I think that's a really good thing, because if today, for example, we're holding, you know, large companies accountable, right, for what they, you know, can or cannot, you know, say or do, right? You know, large companies accountable, right. For what they, you know, can or cannot say or do right. You know, a company like Carbysc, who is, you know, developing innovation or innovative products for the consumer, right. You know, it builds a really good, a really good bridge, right. With the consumer. It's good. It's good for, for everyone.

Good for everyone. And again, if we haven't been clear, when you do sign up for garbage day go to garbage day.com slash toronto mic do it there it's very quick and easy and uh great service and you can you can uh you can thank me later now uh rodrigo and jessica uh in a moment i have a few songs now i have okay so i have one song from you. Who chose, we don't want to spoil what it'll be, because they'll hear it when they hear it, but who chose the song I got from you guys?

I did, I did. Not me. Does Jessica even know what it is? It's a surprise for me. I don't really know what it is yet. Rodrigo, you got to involve the developers too. You can't forget the smart people't i wanted to leave it a surprise because i just felt that the song was so awesome right so i'm i'm not worthy of calling if you call

me a developer i think my real developers are going to yell okay so like okay well that's let's clarify that so uh what would you how would you describe yourself an idea person a project manager what are you jessica uh product i guess co-founder of product but you're not writing code is what you're telling me oh no you wouldn't want me writing code jess is our fearless leader how many apps are you responsible for like designing if you if that's a term i can use uh so me personally um this is it. Like this is my, this is what I, you know, my baby. Go big or go home, right? Go big or go home. I've built other apps in the past or other, other sort of web, web solutions, but this is, this is by far the most exciting and different one.

And, and again, if you, if you do own a home in uh well yeah speak that so we speak like everyone listening to us is in toronto but i mean i can tell you because when i have kim mitchell on the program i'm i'm getting people are sending in questions from uh all over can't all over ontario for sure but i mean i'm getting stuff from all over Canada. So where in this wonderful country that we live in, where does Garbage Day work? We're in like over 40 cities, Ontario, BC, Manitoba, and Alberta. Certain select cities in Alberta and Manitoba.

So just sign up. And if it's not applicable to your area, you get a very nice little note that just says coming not here yet coming soon yeah yeah actually what happens is so we're like i said everything is user user led right so it's by popular demand so if you're not in an area that we service you can still sign up and it it sort of becomes like you pre-register and then if you tell your friends and sign up as well you kind of bump up your city on the list and then we'll go there next it's like a it's like when uh ace i think no

kiss i think it was was a kisser i'm trying to remember i think it was kiss was uh having a contest which on which small ontario city they would play in and they uh had like a contest or something like that and i don't know it all comes back to kiss but okay so uh going back to something rodrigo said earlier uh that really does frustrate me on a personal level is how broken i think our recycling program is like you mentioned the pizza box okay and i'm like i find it like this whole i don't know if it's an education problem or if it's just like we need to make it so that you it you can you can recycle the pizza box with cheese stains on it or whatever but the uh the amount of recycling that goes in a recycling bin in this city that is actually not

recyclable like uh it i i is it is it like is it a is it education? Is it that the, and this is a big question. I'm asking a big question before we lighten this up with some jams. But, like, is it that the processing is flawed, like fundamentally flawed? Like, how do we fix that? How do we fix it? I think it's a combination of things. So, on one end, you have definitely education, right?

Becoming more educated about what can be recycled, how to recycle things, why you must wash certain things, right? So for example, if you, you know, finish a jar of peanut butter, right? You should be, you should wash it before recycling it because- And it's tough to wash because oil and water don't mix, very difficult. Absolutely, right? So, but then, you know, if you don't wash it and you turn the recycling bin like that. Right. Then what happens is even even a teaspoon of peanut butter will contaminate a large portion of the recycling. Right. So you got it. You have to go. But then that also leads to the other thing, which is proper recycling can be very difficult and time-consuming for the individual, right? And so, you know, it's sort of like, you know, we're trying to solve the problem of making it, you know, the education piece, making it more accessible to people.

But at the end of the day, and to raise awareness to the benefits of recycling, at the end of the day, the consumer also has to, you know, put in the effort and the work to make sure that they're recycling properly. And then, so I'm just going to jump in here around, here's where we can make an impact sort of even earlier in that funnel, right? So if you think about like dish soap, for example, right? Every time you go through dish soap, you have a bottle, right? What if instead of buying the bottle, you started buying refillable dish soap, right? I do this for hand soap. I do this for hand soap. I do

this for hand soap. Yeah. Yeah. And so I'll give you an example with a brand that we partner with called Etty. And I love this brand because they're called E-T-E-E. Everything touches everything else. And they sell like refillable dish soap, refillable hand soap. And especially now where there's so much like hand washing, right? I mean, imagine the soap bottles you could save by just doing that in one household, multiply by that by 100,000, a million, there's the impact that we're trying to make, right? And so, well, how do we do that? Well, let's connect people with brands like these, if you've never heard of them, or maybe let's get some cool promos in there so that people, you know, start having an incentive to buy some of these or try out these brands. And maybe once you try them, you never go back, right? And then on the other side, too, is,

you know, how can we reuse the stuff that we were otherwise going to throw away, right? So we recently launched a campaign with Tiffany Pratt from HGTV, where, you know, so we're calling it Trash Talk with Tiffany. And so we have four episodes and Tiffany is pretty much walking you through four different projects that you can do with your recyclable materials. Very interesting. Yes. Okay. So it's, you know, you can't think of it as like a desert. We got to look at this as many grains of sand. And we just got to take it. Yeah.

How do you eat? What is that? How do you eat? I don't like this. This is an expression I heard and I've been using it. And then I realized I hate it because we shouldn't be eating elephants. Okay. But they say, how do you eat an elephant?

Okay. Just who's eating elephant? I don't know. But you eat an elephant one bite at a time that's how you eat an elephant and i like it the sentiment and i don't think it uh i don't think we should be eating elephants but okay so go ahead by paper cuts death by paper yeah yeah yeah death by yeah a thousand cuts or whatever yeah absolutely something like that i need to write down all these idioms.

Idioms for idiots. I'm going to write that book. Don't steal that idea at RBC Ventures. I recorded this. That's my idea. All right. When the app arrived in my life and I started using it, I would get my notification on a Tuesday night at 7 p.m.

And in my mind, I would sing a song. And this is a song I haven't thought of in decades. So you guys have to because it's my show you have to humor me here for a moment here uh I am older than you guys I'm way older than Jessica but I'm even older than Rodrigo I think I'm way older than you guys uh you'll correct me later if I'm wrong uh way older but I used I had an album a cassette I'd say i had a cassette from a like do you guys know raffy yeah okay so raffy's a bfd uh you know what bfd stands for raffy's a big deal and a guy came to our school in like 1981 i want to say maybe 1982 a guy came to our school to perform he wasn't raffy raffyy was the big, big celebrity in my life.

And this was like a Raffy wannabe, I'd call him. And he came to our school and he played these songs. And I loved this music so much. I asked my mom to buy me the cassette from this guy. And his name, so okay, there's a song I had on this cassette, which I sing every time i get my garbage day uh see this is a long story but it's worth it because i'm gonna play the song now but i had to google to remember i had i found it on youtube and it's been decades since i had it but i found it on

youtube and i want to give credit to who we're gonna hear here the guy's name who came to my school his name is jerry brody jerry brody came to my school, his name is Jerry Brody. Jerry Brody came to my school and he had eco-conscious songs. See, I should point out, these songs were eco-conscious in the early 80s and they really resonated with me. But as I look at the credits online, I see it's credited to Kim and Jerry Brody.

So maybe Kim wasn't available that day and didn't make it to my school, but Kim and Jerry Brody sing this song. So let's hear a little bit about the song I sing every Tuesday night when I get my garbage day alert. Garbage, garbage, no, no, no. Do you know where your garbage goes? Do you just rub it from your hand?

You must put it in the can, man. you must put it in the can man you must put it in the can man if you take leftover vegetables and throw them out your window now it would only be a matter of time before you slip slip slip it around garbage garbage no no no do you know where your garbage goes? Do you just drop it from your hand? You must put it in the can, man You must put it in the can, man If you take newspapers and...

And there's Kim of Herverse, but they continue to tell you what you should be doing with your garbage. I love that. I'm a little, I'm a little emotional and that nostalgia is hitting me hard because I had this cassette and he wasn't knowing. And I always,

Raffi was the big celebrity pre Fred Penner, who's an FOTM by the way, but you know, Raffi was the man, but Jerry Brody was in my house. So then I remembered another, that's another, I call that a garbage song. And then I remembered, okay, well, how many people listening will know Jerry Brody? Maybe nobody.

But there is a children entertainment that everyone listening knows. And there is a famous trash song for children that I'm going to play right now. Okay, listen to this. Everyone on Sesame Street is always talking about love. Yuck. But now it's time for me to tell you what Oscar the Grouch loves, the thing that grouches love best of all. Oh, I love trash.

Anything dirty or dingy or dusty. Anything ragged or rotten or rusty. Yes, I love trash. If you really want to see something trashy, look at this. I have here a finger that's bad and warm. Do your kids still listen to the odd Sesame Street jam? They enjoy Sesame Street quite a bit. Yes, they do. Yeah. My daughter loves it, too.

We took her to this museum in the States where they actually had the Sesame Street sets. And she loved it. How old is your daughter she's seven you know i i thought i'm sorry i uh i just assumed you're too young to have a seven-year-old uh maybe my time my zoom screen is a little uh foggy here i gotta clean it i think there's a filter you you know? Okay, so yeah, so there's Oscar. And before I play your jam, and I know, Jessica, you're going to hear it for the first time. Rodrigo made a decision on your behalf here.

So let me fade out the great Oscar the Grouch. I can hear in the background some construction going on, but that's okay. These mics are really unidirectional. I'm just playing this because earlier today, I recorded with Bob Weeks

from TSN. Bob Weeks, he covers curling, but he's most famous for covering golf. He's a golf analyst for TSN. Anyone who knows rock and roll and knows golf knows that the rocker who might love golf the most is a guy named Alice Cooper. And here's a song, and I'll just play a bit of it because it's a little different from those first two.

But here's a little bit of Alice Cooper. So give me about 60 seconds of this. And in the way you crawl across the cat house floor And in the way you curse me when you slam the That is from It's not the way you love me when you turn to trash That is from his album Trash. Nice. Correctamundo, Rodrigo. Very good. Yeah, that is from the album Trash.

His hit song was Poison from that album. Oh my God. So I bought that. I used to... Oh, you were not here yet, but I was listening to Q107 a lot, and they played a lot of that trash album. Rodrigo, you had that CD or that album?

That album, yes. Remember there was one song I always loved which had Steven Tyler on it. Do you remember this? Oh, it's the name of the song. It's only, only, only, only my heart talking. Remember? Saying things I never thought I'd say.

Can't you hear me talking? And then you had Steven Tyler doing his Steven Tyler stuff like, talking to you. He does this whole like scat thing or whatever. And there was another great jam on that album with Bon Jovi. Oh, it was, crap. He's going to kill me after we're done recording. I, what was... Crap. He's going to kill me. After we're done recording, I'm going to be so upset I didn't come up with it.

But maybe while I set up this next song, Jessica, can you Google Alice Cooper... I was just going to do that. Alice Cooper, Bon Jovi. Because once you give me the title, I'll do you the honor of singing it for you.

But anyway, these three songs I've played so far are sort of like trash jams that I came up with, two for the kids and one for us adults. But I'm about to play your trash song here. So let me see if Jessica comes up with the Bon Jovi. This is from the album Trash, which I think was 89, but I could be wrong. This is from, I was in high school. This is maybe 90 album Trash, which I think was 89. But I could be wrong. This is from, I was in high school. This is maybe 90.

Trash. Oh, you're definitely much, much, much older. I tried to warn you about that. So, Jessica, do we have a, have you got the Google food there? Oh, no. And a lot of pressure on you. A lot of pressure. The whole world is waiting.

Because until I get this answer, I can't play your jam here. Oh, poison? No, it's not poison. Here I'm doing it. Hell is living without you. That's it. Hell is living without you. Hell is living without you. Hell is living without the Garbage Day app.

That's what I would say. All right. This is the song for you guys submitted to me by Rodrigo Fernandez. Here we go. let's go baby it's rotten so rotten here so rotten oh It was like the last day before trash day My place was getting kinda nasty Even though the garbage I knew would reach

Thought that I could leave it for one more week Then I'm takin' first to cakin' Chili and greasy old bacon Throw it all on top of the mess I've been makin' Wife's so mad she starts to shakin' Leaky bag and now the girl is gagging She's nagging I need you to get that stuff off the kitchen floor Is that too much to ask you for?

But I see no reason why Can't let a few more weeks go by And that garbage is piled up high And buddy you should see the flies I said there's something rotten here You better hold your nose. Oh, boy, there's a lot here. A lot, and every day it grows.

Nelly, eat your heart out. Weirdo Yankovic is here. Wow, I was like, yes, this is one of my jam. And then I was like, oh, these are not the lyrics. These are not the lyrics. That is the genius of Weird Al, huh? He's just a genius. Beautiful.

I love, I still actually, I gotta say, I had a lot of time for Weird Al. I was a Dr. Demento listener and absolutely loved Weird Al forever. So good choice, Rodrigo. Very nice. I'm looking in the sky right now so uh this is probably the fifth time or sixth time i recorded the backyard uh since the the covid pandemic uh hit us all and this is the first time the sky looks like it might rain like i actually have to bring my gear inside or it's going to cost me a small fortune but uh jessica rodrigo uh thanks so much for this like this deep dive into the the ongoing history of garbage day

that was fun absolutely we had a great time we'll have to do it again sometime maybe to talk about all those other great apps uh as they come on board uh as happy happy sponsors of the toronto mic enterprise here what a pleasure it is to have they come on board. Happy sponsors of the Toronto Mike Enterprise here. What a pleasure it is to have you guys on board. Great app, great work and I can't wait

to see you guys in person at some point. Where we'll share a meal of Palma Pasta, right? Oh, the most authentic Italian food.

Yeah, and when it is safe for you guys to come over, I'll hook you up with some frozen lasagna from palm up pasta you'll love it you'll love it um very nice and that brings us to the end of our 680 second show you can follow me on twitter i'm at toronto mike and uh well garbage day dot sorry garbage day co is the handle on Twitter if you want to follow Garbage Day. And because you guys are going to kick it up a notch, you're going to return to posting on Twitter.

Hopefully. Maybe. I don't know. But you guys should. It'd be great to have you out in there. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. The Keitner Group are at The Ke Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U.

The Keitner Group are at The Keitner Group. Pumpkins After Dark are at Pumpkins Dark. And of course, as you've heard over the last hour, Garbage Day are at GarbageDay.com slash Toronto Mike. See you all next week. And I don't know what the future can hold or do for me and you But I'm a much better man for having known you

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