Massachusetts Recycling Center Threaten Boycott over Glass

Nearly 40 redemption centers across the state of Massachusetts are threatening to stop taking glass for a month, beginning April 9. Additionally, these recyclers centers are asking customers to halt their purchase of glass bottles.

The recycling centers say that the goal of the threatened boycott is to show the state and beverage distributors that if they don't start changing their policies, redemption centers will go out of business and there will not be enough places to recycle glass.

Christi Muise, owner of the Colonial Shoppe Redemption Center of Hudson, is leading the boycott as president of the Massachusetts Redemption Coalition.

She said customers have been receptive to the idea since she started telling them about it a week ago. "Once they understand, they really want to help us," Muise said.

Redemption centers have been saying for years that the fee they receive for recycling bottles and cans, 2.25 cents each, which has not changed since 1990, is not enough.

And in July, redemption centers will likely see a surge in the number of empty glass bottles coming through their doors because of Gov. Mitt Romney's plan to charge a 15-cent deposit on liquor and wine bottles.

The redemption centers will lose money on glass, though, because it requires more space and time.

This boycott is meant simply to "galvanize the consumer," not hurt package stores, Muise said.

According to the Bottle Bill, a store is required to redeem any recyclable bottle or can it sells, but "not everybody in the town redeems," Bacon said. "At most convenience stores, you should be able to, (but they don't do it because) there's no money in it."

Another problem, according to redemption store owners, is the company which collects and processes used beverage containers in the state, Tomra Massachusetts, LLC, a branch of Tomra International.

"We're at their mercy," Muise said. Tomra is the only company that takes used bottles and cans, and they are making it much more difficult and expensive to take glass, say owners such as Michele MacLean of M&M Bottle and Can in Hyde Park.

She has followed guidelines on how to separate the glass, only to find that her glass is not accepted by Tomra, or the container numbers are undercounted, she said.