Office Supplies Ink Toner And Recycling How You Can Make A Big Difference For Our Earth

Recycled office supplies have been around for years, and finally more businesses have a growing interest in actually buying recycled office products. The fact is many people are recycling their office paper and plastic goods today, but not nearly as many are buying products made from recycled materials. To really complete the final step in the "Green Recycle" triangle - Reduce, Recycle and Reuse - people need to reuse the recycled materials by buying green products.

So how can companies from small businesses to large Fortune 500 corporations make the biggest positive impact for our environment? The first thing to consider is recycling all used ink and toner cartridges, and then purchasing remanufactured ink jet printer and laser printer cartridges for your business. This not only creates a huge positive impact for our planet, but using remanufactured cartridges can also save you as much as 50% on your ink and toner purchases.

Consider these facts. Accoring to the International Imaging Technology Council, each discarded laser cartridge adds almost 3-1/2 pounds of plastic and metal waste to our landfills, and laser cartridges produce garbage that will take over 100 decades to decompose, (that's 1000 years!). It's estimated that almost 400 million ink jet printer cartridges and over 100 million laser printer cartridges are manufactured every year.

The IITC estimates that remanufacturing these cartridges will save four million cubic feet of landfill space. More than 3 quarts of oil are used to produce each laser cartridge, so recycling your cartridges and using remanufactured ink and toner in your office saves significant energy resources for future generations.

So how does one go about recycling their used ink and toner cartridges? There are independent online office supply companies that are part of new program called Greencycle that I highly recommend. It's quick, easy and makes me feel good that I'm doing my part. First, find an office products dealer who offers this service. I use a company that does good work by donating 50% of profits to charity, but you can decide which office products dealer is best for you.

Contact that office supply company, sign up for the program, and they will supply you with free boxes. Instead of throwing your empty cartridges in the trash can, just place the empty cartridges in the provided recycling box. Each box has a prepaid UPS shippng label affixed to it, so when the box is full of cartridges, simply give it to your UPS man, and off it goes to be recycled or remanufactured. The savings to the planet, and to your bottom line are significant.

The second thing to do is switch all your copy and printer paper purchases to recycled copy paper. The fact is copy paper is the single highest volume office product used by both large and small offices today. Switching a high volume commodity item from virgin material to recycled content makes a significant impact on the environment. So what recycled copy paper is best?

There is one brand that stands out from the rest, and is hands down the best quality and value. Navigator Premium Recycled copy paper is an incredible 95 brightness paper, and contains 75% recycled content. 30% of the material is post consumer waste which actually reuses all that paper that goes through your office printer every day. You can find Navigator Premium Recycled paper at quality online office products dealer under item number SNANR1120.

Do you part for the environment, and actually save some money in the process. First, recycle your ink and toner cartridges using the Greencycle program offered by top online office supply companies, and buy remanufactured ink and toner cartridges like the Innovera brand. Second, buy Navigator Premium Recycled copier paper while also recycling all your paper, plastic and aluminum waste in your office. Let's leave a better planet for our future generations.

Stephan R Vonn is an Office Products guru who loves to tell people about Zuma Office. They have great prices on products like report covers, and they practice Conscious Capitalism by supporting great charities! Learn more and save!