landfill-diversion
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Kristy Caylor
Kristy Caylor is the founder and CEO of Trashie, the first scaled recycling-and-rewards platform in the US, whose internet-famous Take Back Bag lets people stuff a closet's worth of unwanted clothes and old gadgets into a prepaid mailer and get rewarded in TrashieCash to spend at places like Sephora and Uber Eats. An industrial engineer by training who spent two decades in fashion (Gap, Banana Republic Japan, Gap's Product RED, and the ethical-luxury label Maiyet she co-founded), Caylor built Trashie out of For Days, the circular apparel brand she launched in 2018. Her bet is that sustainability wins when it is convenient and fun rather than guilt-driven, and the numbers back her: hundreds of thousands of bags sold and millions of items kept out of landfills.
RoadRunner
RoadRunner (RoadRunner Modern Waste + Recycling) is a Pittsburgh-based, technology-driven waste and recycling company that helps commercial and enterprise businesses cut costs, divert more material from landfills and report on their environmental impact. Founded in 2014 by Graham Rihn, it pairs a managed-services model with proprietary software and AI-powered smart cameras (via its 2022 acquisition of Compology) to meter, monitor and optimize waste streams. The company serves 14,000+ customers across all 50 states and has raised roughly $150M in venture funding.
Graham Rihn
Graham Rihn is the founder and CEO of RoadRunner, a Pittsburgh-based company that uses data and AI to modernize commercial waste and recycling. A Cornell economics grad and former college linebacker who grew up in Allison Park, Pennsylvania, Rihn started RoadRunner in New York City in 2014 after watching garbage pile up on Manhattan streets and asking why an $85 billion industry had skipped the technology revolution. He moved the company to his hometown of Pittsburgh in 2017 and grew it from roughly 30 people in three cities to more than 500 employees serving over 12,000 customers nationwide, raising more than $150 million along the way, including a $70 million Series D led by General Atlantic.
Trashie
Trashie is a recycling and rewards platform that makes responsible disposal of clothing, textiles, and electronics frictionless. Customers buy a Take Back Bag, fill it with unwanted items in almost any condition, mail it back, and earn TrashieCash redeemable for rewards at hundreds of brands. Built by the team behind zero-waste fashion brand For Days, Trashie turns the chore of recycling into a rewarded habit while diverting millions of pounds of waste from landfills.