Mill and Compost Crew launch food scrap recycling service

Mill Industries Inc., a San Bruno, California-based company specializing in food waste prevention, has partnered with organics recycling company Compost Crew Inc. of Rockville, Maryland, to expand food scrap recycling across Maryland, northern Virginia and the Washington metropolitan area (DMV).

The Mill + Compost Crew food recycling service will combine Mill’s food waste technology with Compost Crew’s food scraps pickup service and local composting infrastructure, aiming to keep food out of landfills and turn household food scraps into compost that is returned to local communities.

“We are delighted to partner with Mill to develop this new offering for DMV residents,” Compost Crew CEO Ben Parry says. “Compost Crew has helped tens of thousands of people start composting, yet hundreds of thousands of area homes still send their food waste to the landfill or incinerator, which is an inefficient use of resources and creates harmful methane emissions. Mill’s technology provides an innovative alternative for people who have been hesitant to take that first step into food scrap recycling in the kitchen, while Compost Crew handles the rest.”

Households across the DMV can sign up for the service, which starts at $39 per month. Customers will receive a Compost Crew bucket and a Mill food recycler, which dries and grinds food scraps into clean, dry grounds. Compost Crew trucks will complete pickups either monthly or every other month.

The collected grounds are then processed at Compost Outpost sites, operated by Compost Crew. These modular food scrap composting sites are built and operated in partnership with local farms and other partners around the DMV. Grounds are processed into a nutrient-rich soil amendment to be used on nearby farms and gardens. Participating households also are eligible to receive free finished compost each year as part of the program.

“We’ve long admired Compost Crew’s industry-leading composting infrastructure, which allows them to compost food scraps at scale in a hyper local way and return those resources back to the community,” Mill Co-founder and President Harry Tannenbaum says. “We’re thrilled to introduce this new service together so more people across the DMV can reduce waste without the work.”