Where does all our waste go?

From the beginning, we wanted to build sustainability into the fabric of our company. Working in the restaurant industry eight years prior to Fully Rooted, I saw how much waste of basic recyclables went directly into the trash, not to mention food. It wasn’t because the restaurant maliciously wanted to ruin the earth, it was out of convenience and cost that it was handled in this way.

It may have been just how that one restaurant operated but when you start to think about how many other restaurants, businesses and homes operate in this way it begins to add up. 

Our goal is to mitigate our waste as much as possible because not only is it important to us that we nourish our bodies, we want to ensure that we’re not taking away from the earth in order for us to operate. 

Much of our waste comes from packaging materials from produce we receive, juice pulp and without our reusable jar system it would be packaging of our juice and kombucha. 

Over the years our juice pulp has gone to local farmers, composting bins, and vermicomposters. Now, much of our juice pulp waste goes to Magic Tree to create worm castings. See the pineapple greenery in the image above? It started as a tiny seedling in the earth, grown into a leafy pineapple plant abundant in nourishing vitamins, to our facility to be juiced, given to you in juice form and the waste goes back into the earth. 

We dream of one day where we will have land to do our own composting and vermicomposting right where we produce. For now, we’re grateful for our friend Cushman and his work vermicomposting.

Benefits of vermicomposting our juice pulp:
Keeps food waste and organic materials out of the landfill!
Is nutrient-dense for soil 
Improves soil structure
Contains beneficial bacteria

The cool part is, vermicomposting can easily be done at home too! While we’re certainly not perfect, we continue to learn and find new ways to lessen our impact on the environment around us. All our little efforts add up in a big way.