The Recycling Entrepreneur Newsletter

_/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/_/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/

(c) Scott D. Andrews 2003 - February, 2003 - ISSN: 1539 - 6789
_/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/_/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/

In this issue:

1. Announcements & Commentary

2. $60 For Your Used Cell Phones?

3. So - You REALLY Want To Refine Auto Catalyst?

4. Scott, How Do I Make $500 Per Day Recycling?

***************************************************
THIS IS AN OPT-IN Mailing List. You are receiving this issue
because you or someone using your email address joined our
mailing list. All requests are kept on file for verification.
Removal instructions are at the close of this mailing.
A special welcome to you if you are one of our 400+ new subscribers.
The ranks of Recycling Entrepreneurs is growing by
leaps and bounds!
***************************************************

1. Announcements & Commentary
Welcome to your monthly issue of "The Recycling Entrepreneur". Another month has flown by and we're nearing the completion date for our updated manual. Have you visited the new site yet?

Hope you will do so and especially the discussion forum ( http://www.recyclebiz.com/discuss ). There are some real pros participating in active discussions. I have yet to "drop in" and add my two cents worth - I've wanted to see what kind of questions and feedback were going to develop and not make my guests feel like I was going to be too intrusive.

My goal is to have this be a unique forum where everybody is willing to share their experiences and techniques for making money in recycling. The forum is open to ALL at least until May 1, so don't hesitate to visit, register, and participate. I know a lot of people are "lurking", based on the number of
messages that are viewed by many.

Please, if you have a question or comments, don't be afraid to share it. We'll probably all learn something new. I am still going to send real silver money to select participants in the forum - but you must register to be eligible. Once we hit 100 registered participants (no, it is not necessary to ask a question or give input, only to register) I will contact you if you are one of every nth registrants, so you can tell me where to send your real silver coins.

Also, I'll be sending you a short questionnaire by email after the 1st of March - I hope you'll respond as I really need to get your feedback on how we can improve and help make you money through recycling. I've been studying a few new companies with unique recycling niches and I want to give you just a quick
glimpse of what is possible without anything but some desire and determination.

A more complete version of this information will be in the new chapter of the manuals entitled "Disposables". The latest chapter on recycling specialty alloys is now online and available for downloading if you're a current owner of the manuals and/or CD-ROM version of "The Recycler's Library"

By the way, the Username and Password for the download area has been changed. Please email me if you currently qualify for access by virtue of being in possession of a paid copy of the manuals, either printed of CD-ROM versions. Let me know when you purchased and your current contact information to obtain the
new access codes. I will email you the new ones right away once you request them - IF I have you in my database. If I don't hear from you, I'll be sending you the info when the new manual is completed so you can download the entire revised version.

By the way, here are some links you might want to follow to familiarize yourself with the new site:
http://recyclebiz.com/discuss -discussion forum - open to all until 1 May, after that time to owners of "The Recycler's Library" only !

http://recyclebiz.com/the_recycling_entrepreneur_newsletter.html - the past issues of this newsletter - good reading for real recyclers
http://recyclebiz.com/frequently_asked_questions.html - Our FAQ - if your
question isn't answered, ASK US!
http://recyclebiz.com/metals_and_alloys.html - a number of rare BoM reports, articles on recyling, and stuff you're not likely to find anywhere else.
And, of course, PLEASE visit here: http://recyclebiz.com/online order form.html

2. $60 For Your Used Cell Phones?
Do you have any old cell phones you no longer use? I've replaced mine every couple of years with newer, more feature-laden versions. As a result I accumulated a half dozen or so old phones with no apparent value. Until now the only option has been to donate them to charities. Now, I don't have any problem with making donations to a worthy and needy charitable organization - unless I can get up to $60 each for the items I'm donating.

I've located a company with a unique niche - they pay up to $60 each for certain phones. Of course, not every old phone is worth that much, but they publish a complete price list on their website. When I look at how many phones are replaced regularly by the hundreds of different phone companies in my area
alone, it is easy to see how there are literally tens of millions of these items sitting in boxes and drawers waiting for you to recycle them.

Sure, you could set up a local service buying locally and then selling to this company, and make a ton of money. Here's the access info to their site: http://cellphone.scottrecommends.com There are all kinds of cooperative marketing arrangements you could make with some of the aforementioned charities which already accept many of these same phones as donations and with just about any company selling new phones. Check out this company's site and put on your thinking cap and let me know what you come up with.

But in "The Recycler's Library" I reveal some potentially profit-damaging flaws in the company's marketing techniques as well as how to overcome them. I'll reveal to you how you can easily, cheaply, and quickly corner the market on the millions of old cell phones out there and put at least a dollar apiece in your pocket just for spreading the word.

Oh, by the way, did I mention that they pay for the shipping expenses and even provide postage prepaid boxes to ship your old phones in!

3. So - You REALLY Want To Refine Auto Catalyst?
Despite my repeated attempts to explain the expense and complexities of refining one's own scrap, it seems that many still want to try it. This is especially true of auto catalyst - which is one of the most complex and difficult types of scrap to reclaim precious metal values from. If you're one of the 'hardcore'
refiner types who just won't believe that each successive buyer of your 'cats' is NOT doubling their money (and hence that the amount of PGM's in a converter is much higher than it actually is), here's your solution.

A mining company in Oregon has developed a "countertop" refining unit for recovering Platinum Group Metals (Platinum, Palladium, and Rhodium) from scrap catalyst. This process involves leaching the metals from the surface of the ceramic substrate and then reclaiming it from the 'pregnant' solution electrolytically - which 'should' yield nearly pure PGM's as a result.

What you do with your resultant metals (and what percentage you have to give up to a buyer) is in your hands, as they are not buyers or dealers in metals - only in mining and refining equipment and supplies.

What will it cost you to do this? Well, plan on around $7,000 for the system, and you'd best calculate on spending as least that much more on related equipment and facilities. Then plan on having a steady supply of 'cats', the equipment to open them efficiently (see "High-Profit Recycling" for that info), storage and disposal capabilities, etc, etc.

OK, you say you've got money to burn? Then visit them at: http://home.att.net/~actionmining/catalytic.html Their site is a little weak on specifics of their process, but they have graphics depicting their system. Tell them Scott Andrews at recyclebiz.com sent you. Just don't say I didn't warn you of the drawbacks of "doing it yourself".

4. REALLY, Scott, $500 Per Day Recycling?
I received a letter from a customer last week. He was dissatisfied with some aspects of my manuals because he was not making the kind of money I claim is possible - nor did he know anyone else who is doing so.

When people tell me this I'm not exactly shocked. He made some generally disparaging comments about me and made some comments which showed he had neither read any of these newsletters nor carefully read the manuals either. He'd neither visited the discussion forum and did not even follow some of the basic rules I lay down as absolutely essential to success in this business.

This gentleman also, however, went into great detail as to why he didn't feel he'd benefited from the info. Unfortunately, everything he said was just a rationalization for his refusal to do the necessary work to succeed. He had 'contacted' a 'number' of muffler shops and from a limited amount of feedback he
determined that this was an "old established business niche which makes it very difficult to penetrate".

Really??? The EPA, as well as Johnson-Matthey has stated as recently as two years ago that less than 60% of the available converters in the market are actually being recycled. Does this sound like a mature business which operates efficiently?

Let's see, people have been recycling old gold, photographic scrap silver, and various scrap metals and alloys for a hundred years and more. Catalytic converters have been actively recycled for about 25 years. And EVERY one of these recycling businesses has got be considered a niche. There are new opportunities developing almost daily to recycle myriad other items (cell phones, silver batteries, single-use cameras, etc.)
...Not to mention that there are methods for selling many items for top dollar that weren't being dreamed of ten years ago - ebay and all the other online auction sites available at essentially no cost to everyone!

However, let's put this into perspective. If one were to make $500 per day, working a typical year at five days a week with two weeks of vacation time, you would gross $125,000. Could you live on that? How many people do you know who make that much money from their job? A person with this level of income would be in the top 4% of wage-earners.

And when you realize that the smart self-employed recycler could potentially shelter a huge percentage of his income through smart tax planning (see below) and converting normally non-deductible expenses into deductions, the wage earner would probably have to earn $175,000 to $200,000 to match the effective earning power you'd have if you work wisely.

OK, Scott, you're probably asking, what would I need to do to earn this amount?

Let's not kid ourselves - you'll have to work your butt off for a considerable period before you have your business(es) built to the point you're turning this kind of profit. And this is the very reason that, in all likelihood, you probably won't reach this income level. Why? NOT because the opportunity doesn't
exist, but because your mind is telling you that it is not possible for you to do it! I'll tell you how to overcome that problem momentarily.

Let's assume you've learned how to get your mind to cooperate and you're determined to make $125,000 a year. You've learned that you can get scrap single-use cameras for 10 cents apiece. If you live in an area with a half-million population within a 20 mile radius, you'll find enough photo developers to keep you busy buying and picking up scrap cameras. Ok, at this price you've got about a 25 cent profit margin per camera. If an average developer processes a hundred disposable cameras daily, each shop you pick up from is generating $25 daily profit.

If you set up this service with 20 such shops in your area, BINGO! $500 a day in your pocket. What if some of these shops do MORE per day - less work for you! If they do fewer in your area, stretch your geographical area a bit and work a bit harder.

Live in an area with rural or small population? Get creative with your marketing. Send out some news releases to papers in your area stating you buy old cell phones, and refer potential sellers to our company which buys them, taking a minimum of a dollar commission per phone you refer. Just use the techniques in the manual. Or contact the charities in your area that accept the phones as contributions and offer to pay them cash for the phones they've gotten which have scrap value. With the tens of millions of new cell phones sold each year, you KNOW that lots of folks have these things sitting around gathering
dust.

Want to deal in converters? Keep marketing until you've developed an ongoing supply - these days you should be netting $10 minimum profit per 'cat' - and some of the larger ones could give you $20-30 profit each. It'll take a lot longer (and a lot more 'working capital') to succeed in this business today, BUT
you can do it if you persist.

Dental gold and silver? Fifty dollars an ounce profit (for the gold) is easy if you know what you're doing. Or read the newsletters and learn how to get eBay to certify and market you as a specialist in this area - then sell this stuff online FOR the dentist. Take a percentage or flat amount per lot - this should be about the easiest 'selling' you'll ever do! Again, it'll take time and effort to establish your local reputation - after that all you have to do is maintain it.

And how many pounds of scrap tungsten carbide, satellite, tantalum, or high speed steels would you need to average a day to earn $500? It depends on the type of alloy you're gathering, but the material IS out there!

My friend, 'all' it takes is a burning desire and determination to succeed. If you don't believe that you'll ever be one of the top 4% money earners - you won't. This is what you need to work on BEFORE you start your business. To paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, if I were given two days to chop down a tree, I'd
spend the first day and a half sharpening my axe. To start "sharpening your axe" go here: http://success.scottrecommends.com

Once you've conquered your inner emotions and motivations, you will find that it really isn't difficult to be better than the competition. My 25 years experience has shown me over and over that simply showing up is 90% of this game. As Wayne Gretzky has stated, "100% of the shots you DON'T take DON'T go in".

Being there, being persistent, and being better than your fellow recycler will serve you infinitely better than rationalizing why you're not succeeding.

Have a great month and say a prayer for those whose task it is to defend and protect us. We'll visit again in a month.

'Til then, thanks for reading.

With Warm Regards - Scott Andrews

P.S. - Want to get a guaranteed $3,000 return for a $97 investment? Go here and GET this information: http://tax.scottrecommends.com There is completely new information here, so even if you've looked at it before, do it again. I was audited last year (the first time in my life!)to the tune of almost $9,000 - if I had this information then I would have saved a large portion of that amount! - S

Please rate this Ezine at the Cumuli Ezine Finder
http://www.cumuli.com/ezines/ra72578.rate

© 2005 FaxVantage Marketing / recyclebiz.com. All rights reserved.
Scott D. Andrews / FaxVantage Marketing /
1192 East Draper Parkway, #412
Draper, UT USA 84020 /
Voice: 801.414.6664 / Fax: 801.523.0414