Just a quick heads up: We just updated our List of Acceptable & Not Acceptable Materials, which you can now find at https://www.gbcompost.com/list/.

(Please note: The above link can also be found at the bottom of the homepage of www.GBCompost.com)

PLEASE DELETE AND/OR RECYCLE ANY OLD COPIES OF THE LIST YOU MAY BE USING OR REFERRING TO AND REPLACE THEM WITH THIS ONE.

A VERY IMPORTANT REMINDER ABOUT BUCKET CONTAMINATION:

Before we summarize the changes that have been made, we would like to use this opportunity to remind all of our subscribers that we do not accept plastic, metal, or glass in our buckets and never have, and that it is our subscribers’ responsibility to remove materials we accept from plastic bags before putting them in their buckets, as well as to remove all stickers, rubber bands, twist ties, tape, staples, etc. from fresh produce before providing it us.

We are bringing this up because in the last few weeks, despite us having not had an enormous number of new subscribers come into the company in the past few months, we have noticed a dramatic uptick in the number of buckets we are picking up which contain contaminants, most notably produce stickers, rubber bands, and non-compostable plastic bags with food inside of them.

We do not know if this has to do with the fact that a few months ago we stopped sending emails to everyone whose buckets we found contamination in, but would like to remind all our subscribers that we still screen the contents of every bucket we receive by hand to identify and remove contaminants, and that when we do find contaminants, we make note of it and whose bucket it was found in, even though we may not send an email about it.

Please know that us no longer (or rarely) sending emails to our subscribers about contamination in our buckets does not mean we no longer care about it or that it isn’t a major problem for us, when we find it.

Contamination is, and always has been, a major concern of ours, as it is for all composters, especially whereas the quality of our compost (and the time it takes us to produce it), depends on the materials we receive being as contaminant-free as possible.

It takes a lot of time and a lot of work for us, as a small, two-person, family-run business to screen the contents of 70+ buckets each week, and we kindly request that all subscribers help us keep contaminants out of their buckets by:

1. Removing all stickers, rubber bands, twist ties, tape, etc. from fresh produce as soon as it is brought home
2. Double-(and triple, if necessary)-checking materials before they’re added to our buckets, to ensure they’re not contaminated with plastic, glass, metal, etc.
3. Not allowing young children or friends/family members who are not familiar with our List of Acceptable & Not Acceptable Materials to add materials to our buckets, without appropriate coaching and/or supervision

Please know that if you put contaminants in your buckets, you’re hurting us, but you’re also hurting yourself (assuming you ever intend to buy compost from us, or earn any through our Waste Reduction Rewards Program) and anyone else who may wish to do so, because the amount of time we have to spend on producing the compost (which includes pulling contaminants out of it), directly relates to the price we charge for it, as well as the quality of it (which is very high, because of how much time we spend screening contaminants out of it).

Bottom line: We alone cannot keep our compost clean. We need your help, because we receive almost all the feedstock for our compost from you. So please, help us (and yourself) by not letting contaminants come anywhere near our buckets, and in return, we will continue providing you the same great service you’ve always received from us, and producing the best compost anywhere within 100 miles of Green Bay.

Thank you in advance for your help with the above! We very much appreciate it.

TO SUMMARIZE THE CHANGES TO OUR LIST:

Now that that’s out of the way, we’d like to go over the changes made to our List of Acceptable & Not Acceptable Materials, which are relatively minor:

• We have added Bread to the Acceptable side of the List as a stand-alone item we accept, because despite our previous Lists stating we accept any grains or grain-based materials, including bread, we have been asked quite often over the past few months whether we accept bread. So hopefully this update clears up any confusion surrounding this.
• We have updated our listing of dead/dying houseplants on the Acceptable side of the List to indicate that we just don’t want them to have been chemically-treated, meaning diseased plants are now okay. Also, we have clarified that it is thick root balls we do not want (which should be removed from plants before placing them in our buckets). Roots in general, as well as root balls that can be easily torn apart or crumbled by hand are completely fine by us (think seed starts, for example).
• We have updated our listing of plain/matte paper and cardboard on the Acceptable side of the list to align with an email we sent to all subscribers on 9/21/22 which stated that we no longer accept junk mail or its contents. In determining whether something is “junk mail” or not, we ask our subscribers to use common sense, and if you’re not sure if what you’re thinking of putting in your bucket is junk mail or not, we humbly request you recycle it instead (and this especially goes for envelopes with plastic windows and/or stamps on them).
• We have updated the Acceptable side of the list to indicate that we still accept pumpkins and gourds, assuming they can fit in our buckets, but have removed “corn stalks” and “straw bales,”because these things can clearly not fit inside our buckets and never should have been on this List (which is not a list of things we accept in general, but rather things we accept in our buckets) to begin with.
• We have updated our listing of soft-shelled crustacean shells on the Acceptable side of the list to indicate that we accept crab legs and lobster tails, as we were recently asked by a subscriber if we would take crab legs and lobster tails from a seafood party they were attending, and realized that this section of the List needed to be more clear.
• We have updated the Not Acceptable side of the List to clarify that we do not want lawn grass or lawn mower clippings, period. It does not matter whether the grass has grown in a subscribers lawn or they found it in their garden; we do not want it, period, because the risk of weed-killer/glyphosate/Round-up contamination with grass is unacceptably high.
• We have updated the Not Acceptable side of the List to clarify that when we say we do not want root balls, it is not, say, seed starts we are referring to or small clumps of roots that can be easily torn apart or crumbled by hand, but rather thick balls of roots like those attached to potted mums. We had to make this change because we continue to receive a lot of questions about root balls. Basically, the rule of thumb is, if you can’t pull the root ball apart with your bare hands, we don’t want, because we also can’t pull them apart.
• We have updated the Not Acceptable side of the List to add “Swiffer” pads as Not Acceptable, in addition to wet wipes and baby wipes, because, for some odd reason we just received a Swiffer pad last week, and for those who do not know, Swiffer pads (and other, similar pads) are made with synthetic fibers (which are something that has been on the Not Acceptable side of our list since Greener Bay Compost started).

If you have any questions or concerns about any of the above changes to our List, or anything else mentioned in this announcement, please let us know by using any of the contact methods available at www.GBCompost.com/Contact.

Until next time, best wishes and happy composting!