Pile of ScrapEp. 40: Gearing Up for 2021
Coming as a sigh of relief to many, 2020 is finally over, and it’s time to start gearing up for the year ahead. Looking back on all the experiences we’ve had and memories we’ve made on Pile of Scrap, we can say that we’ve learned a few things that we can carry with us into 2021. To kickstart new beginnings, John goes over the importance of this industry, getting our voices heard and, overall, how critical it is to stay positive moving forward through the year.
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John Sacco
Transcription:
Intro: The following is an original audio series from Sierra International Machinery: Pile of Scrap with your host John Sacco.
John Sacco: Hello, hello, hello and welcome to Pile of Scrap. The first episode of 2021. Welcome, everybody. I hope everybody had a wonderful holiday season and a happy New Year, and that everybody's safe and healthy as we go straight into 2021. What a year 2020 was. Um, I think all of us are going to be telling people down the road, “Where were you when COVID hit?” So, let's help the vaccine takes hold and, uh, you know, the cases start dropping dramatically and people stop getting sick and people, uh, can start moving on with their lives, get some economies open, states open, and we can move forward and have a tremendous 2021. I'm looking forward to it. I'm really excited. I mean, we're starting the New Year off… Uh, tremendous with the pricing of our commodity, you know, paper – OCC prices is up, aluminum, on copper, stainless, scrap iron... Right now, we're seeing some strong pricing out there and the world is coming back. The economies are opening up in Asia and in Europe and even in the U.S, even with all the unemployment, we still have growth and we're looking forward to a great 2021. So, meantime, which we start out here in 2021, I can't quite get out there on the road yet and do some of the episodes of Pile of Scrap and do the new episodes of The Extra Ton, which we had a lot of fun doing this last year. We have some great ideas. Uh, we're going to wait a little bit on this – um, let the COVID settled down before we get out there, but we're going to. We have some – we have some fun stuff coming up at Sierra as well. You know, it's all about the messaging about getting the word out about ‘Recycling is essential’ because without our materials that we feed into critical manufacturing, nothing gets made. Now, I’ve had this statement – I’ve made this comment before in other podcasts, but it's just so true. And, I want to encourage everybody, every company, anybody who's listening that has a social media platform: Make sure you're out there letting the world know in your local community and all over: the value of recycling – the value of what our industry does to keep the oceans clean, and keeping the mountains clean, and the rivers clean, and lakes clean, because without us, where's the – where's the outlet? Landfills? That's not the solution. Less material in the landfills, more materials in the recycling stream. That's what I'm looking forward to. And, I've posted a lot of, uh, photographs here in the last, oh, month and a half, really reiterating the essential aspect of recycling. And, you know, I, uh, like the central coast of California in Santa Barbara area. I walk on the beaches very often and they're clean. They're spotless. And, and I know the message is out, but you know, we have to have clean oceans and we're – we want to work on that. I'm working with company and some other folks this year… Stay tuned on some ideas we have about the oceans and keeping plastics out of the ocean. And, you know, I walk – we have a lake here and I like walking around that lake as well. And, uh, you know, it's pristine and the river is the Kern River, you know? Mighty Kern River. You know, Merle Haggard wrote a song about the Kern River. It's a great river. And, uh, you know, it's part of Bakersfield. When you grow up here, you know about the Kern River and it's – and we want to keep it pristine as well. And, and I hiked the trail of Santa Barbara called the Franklin Trail this last weekend… Again, pristine. I didn't see any litter. And, that's the message that our industry – ‘We are the outlet,’ you know? ‘Bring us your recyclables.’ We know how to properly – Our industry knows how to process it and get it back to the consumers for re-purposing. It is our industry. And, get that message out there. You know, we have a new administration coming in and whether you're excited or disappointed, that's irrelevant because you have to get the message out to the new regulators, the new people, and all these agencies in Washington, DC and all the new a–people in agencies across America and all these states. Why? Because they have to be educated on what we do. There's going to be a lot of people who really don't know and understand the recycling industry. Get out there, let them know. We have to do this. It's paramount for survival for our industry. So, things that Sierra, you know, a little bit and 2021, we have, uh, some new equipment that's going to be introduced. We’re excited about that. Very innovative, uh, sub equipment for the waste industry. And, that'll be good. You know, we want to, uh, reduce the waste that we can in landfills. Um, so we – we're excited about the innovation we have in the progress. And, you know, one thing about Sierra, we have a lot of experiencing. And, a lot of that experience comes from the fact that we are processors and we own our own recycling facility. And, we do demolition and we work in the oil fields. And, you know, how do you work in the oil fields? Well, the first and foremost is, you have to be safe. Safety is paramount to the success of all our businesses. And, you know, that's our goal every day to send our employees home with the way they came to work, you know, with all their body parts, eyes, and teeth and ears, and et cetera… Let's hope that this 2021, people get a grip on, ‘Hey, safety is paramount to everything we do on everyday basis.’ Uh, you know, our recycling facility, we're growing, we're doing our part to get materials – get these raw materials to the critical manufacturing because without it, materials can't be made in this country and in the world. Recycling is essential. And, that's why I'm very passionate about this. This is why I'm continuing the podcast even with a little bit of slow down and traveling. Look, our industry is vital, essential – you name it. Use the adjective you want. But, without us, so much doesn’t happen. And, without us, you know what? I think manufacturing is at a standstill. Litter – litter’s everywhere. Our lakes and everything that we've talked about… There’s more pollution in our water streams, oceans, rivers and lakes. And, that's not that – that's not good. But, you know, I want to invite everybody who listens to this and watches this podcast: Hey, give us your feedback. What do you want to see in 2021? Let's make the Pile of Scrap refreshing. Let's make this podcast innovative and informative to people. You know, this last year, my favorite podcast was when I did the, uh, Beauchamps because they learned about recycling paper from their textbook recycling textbook operation through Pile of Scrap. And, with that, they created their own, uh, notebooks from recycled paper that they took all the paper that was going to be thrown away and got it to a local mill there in Idaho and created their own product. And, to me, that is so satisfying – that somebody who's listened to this podcast actually took some information. Another thing we did at Sierra this last year is the pizza box Superbowl commercial. We had over 400,000 views of that commercial and, you know, the pizza box makers and pizza delivery pizza people are out there… Um, I'm still not seeing it. I'm still not seeing their commercials that recycle. They can recycle pizza boxes, but hopefully this year they'll do it. But look, I'd love your feedback, everybody. What is it that you want to hear? What is it you want to see? You know, I did, uh, some new things this last year with the thing called The Extra Ton where it was part of the podcast, Pile of Scrap, but it was the outtakes and the adventure, like driving the truck with my friend, Buddy Silva. You know, I never drove a semi-truck in my life. And, there I was. And, you know, we did the podcast. He's an old, family – a hard working man… Honest. And, so we got the podcast in, but you know, during the podcast, we got to do fun things. And, then with my brother Philip and my nephew, little Phil… Fly fishing in Wyoming… That was fantastic. I never – fly fishing, catching fish and seeing my brother on his horse that he loves so much. So, you know, that's fun. And, I really enjoy doing Pile of Scrap and I can't wait ‘til I can get out there more and see more people ‘cause there's still a lot of fun things I have left on the agenda, but I want to hear from you. Let us know. Let us know what you want. So, listen, everybody, we're going ahead with 2021. We're not slowing down. I know you're not slowing down. I know my friends in this industry aren't slowing down. I know we're not going to be at ISRI or WasteExpo is up in the air this year because COVID and eventually we're going to get together… It just bums me out. I love ISRI. It's like a big reunion and you get to see all your friends. A big, gigantic ‘hope’ coming in. And, we're going to have that. You know, keep the faith. We're going to have these homecomings at waste, expos and Israelis and all these other conventions then as your chapter meetings and in our NDA and, um, all these other, uh, conventions we do throughout, uh, North and North and South America, we're going to be back and it's going to be fun to see everybody. So, you know, keep the faith, keep the smile. 2021 has a lot of promise in 2021. There's a lot of good out there. And I know there's been some bad things that's happened and you know, I'd be remiss to try to sugarcoat that there has been, but you know what? There's a lot of good things that are going to happen this year. And God bless everybody. Keep forging ahead and, and give us your feedback on Pile of Scrap, what you want to see. And, that's it for the basement version of Pile of Scrap.
Conclusion: This has been a Sierra International Machinery original audio series. Thanks for listening. Please share this podcast and make sure to subscribe.
The Pile of Scrap Podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Play. The Podcast episode videos are available on YouTube. Be sure to Subscribe, Rate, and Review Pile of Scrap.
