A fellow Renegade (thanks David) saw this interesting post on Treehugger.com about Staples’ new recycling program:
Today Staples launched its national “Computer and Office Technology Recycling Program.” Thus becoming the first national store to offer everyday, in-store recycling of pretty much any sort of electronic equipment. Just bring in your computer, monitor, printer, fax machine, scanner, etc. and they’ll recycle it “in accordance with environmental laws.”
Of course, we haven’t yet hit the golden moment…when a big box store will recycle a computer for free (or better yet, pay you for all of those nice expensive materials inside your old equipment). Staples will gladly accept your equipment as long as you give them $10. They will, however, recycle mice and keyboards for free. Frankly, it’s worth $10 to me. I’ve got two broken down printers sitting in my basement, but I’ll be darned if they ever see the inside of a trash bin.
From a Marketing for Good perspective, Staples is smart to start down this path as both a service to its current customers and as a way of generating new customers. Current customers, especially those wanting to be more green, will be more engaged resulting in stronger brand advocates. Those in the market for new equipment may be more inclined to visit Staples since they can drop off the old and pick up the new all in one visit. I can’t imagine this will be an easy program for Staples to execute but it is certainly makes recycling easy for their customers–providing an engaging extension of their “that was easy” campaign.