About Community Champions Program
The Community Champions Program is a uniquely positive approach to raising awareness and ultimately making beverage container recycling more accessible and convenient.
ABCRC provides specialized recycling bins (indoor and outdoor) to Community Champions Partners (CCP), providing more out-of-home opportunities for recycling.
Benefits for Business
- Enables businesses of all sizes, small or large, to give back to the community in a meaningful way by helping both community and not-for-profit groups
- Demonstrates social and environmental leadership to customers, employees and the community at large
- Helps keep the workplace clean and tidy
- Helps keep empty beverage containers out of Alberta landfills
- Creates a sense of pride and community involvement
Benefits for Community and Not-for-Profit Organizations
- Provides a revenue stream for its operations
- Offers start up financial support, initial infrastructure and coaching support
How the Program Works
Businesses who join the program receive recycling bins and bags for their workplace, as well as marketing materials to help promote the program. Participating not-for-profit organizations are then partnered with these businesses, becoming responsible for collecting the empty beverage containers from the recycling bins. The not-for-profits return the empty containers to a local bottle depot and receive 100% of the refund monies.
Examples:
- Schools: In three years, more than 500 schools have participated and over 10 million containers have been collected. Cash awards are given to the top-collecting schools, and the schools receive cash from redeeming deposits.
- Communities: ABCRC provides startup financial support, infrastructure and coaching to not-for-profit groups and the public sector. By increasing recycling points, over five million containers have been diverted from landfills in two years, and community groups have benefited from the redeemed deposits.