As more corporations downsize in the pandemic, a new sustainable decommission method helps businesses divert their furniture waste from global landfills.
In a traditional decommission, a single cubicle represents 700 pounds of f-waste. With hundreds of cubicles in the average office, that’s potentially hundreds of thousands of furniture getting sent straight to landfill.
A new office decommission strategy aims to reduce the strain on waste streams and the environment with a revolutionary way to dispose of unwanted office furniture. This method diverts nearly 99% of waste from landfills by selling, donating, and recycling used office furniture.
How a Sustainable Decommission Strategy Can Reduce F-Waste
Whereas the traditional liquidation method has just two steps (one: sell your assets and two: discard the rest), a sustainable method includes four.
After selling your best assets to companies that buy used office furniture, a sustainable decommission firm will donate used office equipment to a local non-profit or charitable organization in need of new furniture.
Charities across the world are feeling the pinch during the pandemic as need rises and support wanes. Many can’t afford to use their limited programming dollars to buy used office furniture, so this is a precious donation that equips them with essential tools.
Pieces that can’t be sold or donated are then strategically recycled with the manufacturing process in mind. Timber, metals, plastics, and fabrics that would ordinarily be locked in a landfill gain a second life through this sustainable practice.
What’s left is roughly 1% of your assets going to landfill, saving you costly tipping fees and reducing carbon emissions.
The Pandemic Highlights the Need for New Sustainability Targets
Since the pandemic tipped the corporate landscape on its side, there’s been a big change not only to how the world works, but where it works, too. Work-from-home orders have emptied bustling commercial centres across America, and offices are sitting vacant in unprecedented numbers.
That’s according to new reports out of Moody’s Analytics, the research arm of investment company Moody’s Corporation. Its Q4 numbers across eight property types and 3K+ submarkets reveal the country’s vacancy rate hit a historic 19.4%.
Distance from the corporate workspace has given companies a chance to re-evaluate their unused space. Many businesses are de-densifying their offices to create safer workplaces for essential staff, while many more are consolidating and downsizing as they adopt permanent work-from-home measures.
Rising F-Waste is on Course to Overwhelm Waste Systems
In the past, this waste amounted to more than 10 million tons in North America. Now, as corporations close offices in record numbers across the continent, experts predict a bottleneck of f-waste is ready to overwhelm landfills.
Sustainable decommission practices aim to relieve the pressure on the American waste system. It’s an upgrade from old-fashioned and wasteful liquidations.
Although the transition from one method to the next may happen in ebbs and flows, sustainable turnkey decommission services are making an impression and climbing the ranks of the Financial Times’ list of Fastest Growing Companies of 2021.
With sustainability a growing trend in the decommission industry, your downsizing or de-densifying project is no longer the industrial-sized version of taking out the trash; it’s an opportunity to do some good for your community and environment.
