Recycling instead of throwing something away is a noble cause. We have the luxury of recyclables collections with our trash pickup every other week, so we can recycle everything from paper to most plastics to metals without too much effort on our part. But before you recycle, take a moment to think about if you could give the item, whatever it is, one more use (or even more than that!) before it hits your recycle bin.

Papers that show up in our house get used on both sides for scrap paper, and then if margins are clear, they get cut off to make grocery lists. Envelopes that come in the mail get turned into holders for my coupons, or other envelope tasks that don’t require a new clean envelope. Plastic bags get a variety of new uses before I recycle them at the grocery store. A can becomes a pencil holder, a jar holds nails or tacks, a cardboard box becomes a toy storage bin.

Think about the other uses your everyday recyclable items can have before you recycle them. After reduce, the next step is reuse, before you finally recycle.

This frugal tip provided by paidtwice, who uses a lot of scrap paper tutoring chemistry.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 11th, 2008 at 10:13 am and is filed under Frugal Tip. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.