RecycleSmart raises $1.15 million to take the pain out of recycling
More than 1000 investors have backed Sydney-based RecycleSmart, with the recycling startup successfully raising $1.15 million via a Birchal equity crowdfunding campaign.
More than 1000 investors have backed Sydney-based RecycleSmart, with the recycling startup successfully raising $1.15 million via a Birchal equity crowdfunding campaign that closed on Thursday.
Founded in 2019 by Marco Prayer and Giorgio Barracchi, RecycleSmart helps households, businesses and councils dispose of hard-to-recycle items by picking up unwanted waste from a customer’s doorstep.
The startup will pick up soft plastics, clothes, shoes, and small e-waste, and then sort and transfer them to specialist recycling partners like APR Plastics, Mobile Muster, and the Red Cross, which accepts unwanted but wearable clothing.
The startup says it has sent 800,000 kgs of items to be recycled to date but now wants to scale that impact.
This latest fundraise follows a previous $1 million raised by the startup in July 2023, also completed via an equity crowdfunding campaign on Birchal.
In the time since, RecycleSmart has extended its Power Pickup program to businesses, doubled its customer numbers, and is now recording more than $2 million in annual recurring revenue.
It operates in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, and hopes to add every Australian capital city to that list by the end of the year.
Co-founder and CEO Giorgio Baracchi told SmartCompany on Friday these plans are on track to be in place by August 1, 2024.
“With significant corporate partnerships on the horizon, we are poised for even greater growth and innovation in the recycling industry,” he added.
Australia’s “Uber for waste”
While Australians have long been accustomed to using yellow council bins to recycle empty bottles and boxes, RecycleSmart collects almost everything that can’t go in those bins. This includes soft plastics, coffee pods, batteries, blister packs, electronics, and even clothes.
The collections are arranged via an app that allows users to book pickups and offers those same customers insights and data about the collected items.
Soft plastics are shredded and converted into feedstock oil, via the startup’s partners, while clothes and textiles are either donated if they are still wearable or repurposed if not. RecycleSmart also works with partners to extract valuable materials from e-waste and transform polystyrene into raw material that can be used to make park benches, skirting boards, and even bee hives.
RecycleSmart’s business-to-business offering has only been operating for less than 12 months and 800 companies have already registered their interest, according to the startup. This includes the likes of Canva, Google, John Holland, Dolby Australia, Disney Studios and WeWork.
“Every year, Australia sends roughly 76 million tonnes of material to landfill, and corporations account for more than 80% of that,” Giorgio said in a statement provided to SmartCompany.
“With the clock ticking on the federal government’s 2025 National Packaging Targets and Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek pushing for stricter rules to boost recycling, Australian companies are feeling the heat to step up and manage their waste better,” he added.
Dan Bloom, who works as beverage and front-of-house lead at Canva, said in the same statement that RecycleSmart ticks all the boxes for the graphic design unicorn.
“RecyleSmart was able to satisfy all our waste needs and collect everything from one spot,” he said.
“The access to data was also crucial for us. It provides invaluable insights and enables us to congratulate our team and make them feel good about the job they’re doing and about being leaders when it comes to corporate Australia taking responsibility for its waste.”
RecycleSmart, which is also backed by Antler, Brisbane Angels, and Prisma Capital, also works with councils to provide subsidised, regular collections, including large councils like Sydney’s Randwick City Council.
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