Tips and Tricks: Reducing Holiday Waste

The winter holidays are a wonderful source of family, cheer, and light in our lives at the end of the year. There’s nothing I love more than curling up with some hot chocolate and a book next to a fire, twinkle lights glowing on the Christmas tree. But what can we do to enjoy our holidays while staying mindful of the waste we’re creating? What’s the best way to dispose of old Christmas lights, is there a better way to wrap Christmas presents? How can we celebrate the holidays without contributing to the excess waste that already threatens our earth?
 
Here are a few suggestions for how we can do a little better this year:
 

• Cancel catalog subscriptions. Despite the fact that I never intentionally sign up for them catalogs from various retailers (here’s looking at you, Ulta!) just keep showing up in my mailbox. With the holidays, and the subsequent uptick in shopping, it seems as if retailers have redoubled their efforts. A small change I can make, with a minimal investment of my time, would be to call and unsubscribe. Let’s be honest: I do all my shopping online anyway.
• Be creative when wrapping gifts! Can you repurpose the paper bags you brought home from the grocery store? Can you use fabric to wrap presents instead of store-bought wrapping paper, can you save and reuse decorative boxes and bags? Keep the three R's in mind this year and reduce, reuse, recycle when wrapping gifts!
  
• Stick with reusable dishware. Instead of using disposable dishes, consider how much waste you can reduce simply by using reusable plates, cutlery and cups.
• Recycle your broken Christmas lights! Here’s some information on a Christmas Light recycling program. You can mail in your old lights and they do everything from there. Not only are you doing a good deed by recycling, you’ll also be helping Christmas Light Source raise money for Toys for Tots, a program that helps purchase educational books and toys for children in need https://www.christmas-light-source.com/Christmas-Lights-Recycling-Program_c_210.html.
• Only buy the food you need. It’s easy to go overboard stocking the cupboards around the holidays. Keep in mind how much you will actually use, and be mindful about purchasing smaller quantities—especially this year, when we will likely be doing less socializing and preparing food for less people than we’re used to—will be easier to use up and, as such, will create less waste.
• Recycle your unused electronics! If you’re gifted new electronics for the holidays, and no longer have use for some of your old tech, either give them away to others or—if they aren’t usable anymore—hang onto them and turn them in during our Spring 2021 Electronics Recycling event.
• Recycle your corrugated cardboard. If you’re like me, you do a lot of online shopping around the holidays. That means a lot of cardboard boxes. I save some of the larger ones in case I need them for a future move, but if you don’t have the space to do that you can bring them to Keep Chadron Beautiful (or call us and arrange for pick up) and we’ll recycle them!

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It only takes a few steps to make a big impact. This Christmas, let’s give back to the Earth by investing a little bit of extra time and care in the way we handle our waste.