I thought I was done writing about it. Apparently, the Grove had other plans.

A few days ago, I spotted a large, gorgeous feather. My first instinct was to bring it home.

Then I caught myself and spent the next few minutes in a mental tug of war about whether or not to take it home. I kept thinking about shells on the beach. One shell doesn’t matter much. But if every visitor takes just one, eventually there aren’t any shells left for the next person to find.

So I picked it up with a promise to myself to bring it back. Then somewhere along the way, without really realizing it, I’d started collecting little treasures for the shrine I envisioned.

A few months ago, on one of my walks, I found an old(ish) decorative wooden box. I can’t recall exactly where. I just remember wondering how it got there and figured I’d donate it to SCRAP.

Approaching home, my arms full as per usual, I set it on the bench outside my front door.

There it stayed. Then I found the feather.

Around the same time, I rescued a funny little stuffed rainbow. (I can’t remember where I found that either.) It was filthy, so I threw it in the washing machine and then tucked it into the box.

Inside was already a tiny green plastic pen or toy or... honestly, I do not remember putting it there but it seemed absolutely perfect!

Maybe this wasn’t destined to be moved along its rehoming trajectory along with the craft supplies, textiles, and costume jewelry. Instead, maybe this is what is meant to be the first iteration of the shrine, complete with a burgeoning collection of treasures on their way back to the Grove.

I see it there not as something precious. More of an invitation to notice, to leave a tiny treasure if the spirit moves you, to drive home that this is a place we all get to care for.

I envision a little sign in hand-painted lettering on a found piece of wood that reads: Lovingly cared for by your friends and neighbors.

The shrine is now there in the Grove, waiting for the next pieces to be placed with joy and intention. With more evidence of care.

P.S. I was planning to write about back-to-school rehoming this month, but your engagement with last month’s essay made me realize this story wasn’t finished yet.

P.P.S. I’m still planning a clandestine cleanup. There’s something that makes me laugh about the idea of sneaking around to do something kind. A few shovels. Some gloves. Maybe work up a sweat. A picnic afterward. If that sounds like fun, let me know. I’ll keep moving it on my calendar until it finally happens.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

I come here several times a week with my dog, Billie. It is tucked away beyond one of the main paths, in a grove surrounded by redwood trees and wildflowers. The land dips into a small valley, and when I am there, the city seems to disappear. The air smells different. The birds are louder. Time slows down.

In the distance, crows harass hawks that seem to launch themselves from the tops of a stand of redwood trees. I never tire of watching them. The crows are relentless. The hawks seem mostly unbothered.

The whole place feels alive.

And lately, I’ve been picking up a lot of broken glass.

Not just the occasional bottle cap or stray wrapper. Broken bottles shattered into hundreds of pieces. Brown glass. Green glass. Corona bottles. Michelob bottles. The distinctive shape of a liquor bottle. Evidence of gatherings I never attended and stories I will never know.

Sometimes I find myself trying to imagine what happened.

Teenagers?

A celebration?

An argument?

A lonely person drinking by themselves?

Who knows.

All that remains is the aftermath.

One day I was crouched in the dirt, collecting tiny shards, knowing full well I would never find every piece. There would always be another fragment hiding in the leaves, waiting for an unsuspecting dog paw or hiking boot.

And I caught myself thinking: I’ve decided to clean this up for some reason.

Not because anyone asked me to. Not because it is my job.

Not because I belong to a volunteer group. Not because there was a sign-up sheet.

I’ve simply decided that I care what happens here.

The funny thing is that I’ve written before about adopting your local park. My argument was practical. If everyone picked up a few pieces of litter, our shared spaces would be cleaner and more beautiful.

I still believe that.

But something different has been happening.

This no longer feels like a cleanup project. It feels like a relationship.

The more time I spend in this little corner of the grove, the more I notice. The way the light changes throughout the day. The redwood bark. The birds. The wildflowers. The way certain spots feel completely untouched while others bear the marks of human activity.

And then there is the fireplace.

Tucked into the grove is an old brick fireplace built into the hillside. It is a little mysterious. A little hidden. The kind of place where your imagination starts filling in stories.

The first few times I wandered behind it, I half expected to discover a dead body.

Instead, I found ashes. Broken glass. Litter. Evidence of people having been there before me.

And standing there recently, I had an unexpected thought: I want to build a little prayer shrine here.

Nothing elaborate. Nothing permanent. Just a small place for wishes.

Gratitude.

Names of loved ones.

Hopes for the world.

A little shrine to peace and love and getting along and remembering our humanity.

The idea surprised me. Not because I am particularly qualified to create shrines, but because it represented a shift.

Picking up litter is one thing. Creating something beautiful is another.

One removes evidence of neglect. The other leaves evidence of care.

The shrine idea is also, admittedly, a bit of a social experiment.

I have long suspected that the way a place looks influences how people treat it. Neglect seems to invite more neglect. Care seems to invite more care.

Maybe that is naïve.

But I wonder.

I suspect much of the broken glass comes from young people gathering here at night. Drinking. Hanging out. Feeling free and reckless in a way that is increasingly hard to find.

And honestly, I get it.

If you are going to smash a bottle for the sheer satisfaction of hearing it shatter, a hidden grove probably feels like a pretty good place to do it.

Which makes me wonder: What would happen if they stumbled upon a tiny prayer shrine?

Would they ignore it? Add to it? Protect it? Destroy it?

Would it change the culture of the place at all?

I have no idea.

But I find myself wanting to find out.

Not because I expect everyone to behave differently. But because I keep wondering whether visible care has a way of inviting more care.

Maybe I will clean out the ashes. Maybe I will arrange a few stones and seed pods and fallen eucalyptus bark. Maybe someone else will come along and add something of their own.

Or maybe someone will destroy it a week later.

That is the risk of loving things that do not belong to us.

But I keep thinking about how different the world feels when someone has cared for it.

You can feel it in a garden.

In a neighborhood.

In a well-loved home.

In a trail that has been maintained.

In a park where someone stopped to pick up a broken bottle.

Care leaves traces. So does neglect.

And somewhere between picking glass out of the dirt and imagining a tiny prayer shrine, I realized I was not cleaning up a park so much as entering into relationship with it.

Maybe that is what stewardship really is. Not ownership. Not obligation.

Just the decision to care.

And to leave behind a little evidence that someone was here, paying attention.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

The topic: plastic.

More specifically, how plastic production is expected to increase, not decrease, in the coming decades.

Environmental journalist Beth Gardiner, author of Plastic Inc., explained something I had not fully connected before: As electric vehicles reduce demand for gasoline, fossil fuel companies are looking elsewhere for growth. Petrochemicals, including plastics, are a major part of that future.

In other words, even as many of us are trying to reduce plastic in our own lives, the companies producing it are planning to make more.

That’s hard to sit with.

One caller on the KQED program asked a question that really stuck with me:

What if everyone simply used plastic twice?

A piece of plastic wrap. A bread bag. A produce bag. A Ziploc.

Wouldn’t that make a meaningful difference?

And honestly, yes. I think it would.

Reuse matters. Using what already exists matters.

At Next Highest Good, we think about this every day.

Clients sometimes ask us: “Do you bring bags?” The answer is yes. Absolutely.

But here’s the funny thing: We never buy bags.

We reuse paper grocery bags clients already have, extra shopping bags, and whatever else is already in circulation. Leftover contractor bags and garbage bags from projects often end up getting donated because there are simply so many already out there.

My father reads multiple newspapers a day. My mother saves the plastic newspaper sleeves and mails them to me, and we use them for dog poop bags and picking up litter at the park.

(Yes, I know shipping plastic bags across the country is not exactly environmentally neutral. Sometimes I hand-carry a stash home when I’m back on the East Coast.)

Imperfect? Sure.

Useful? Absolutely.

A few members of the Next Highest Good team and I recently went to hear Judith Enck, author of The Problem with Plastic, speak at the Commonwealth Club.

During that conversation, I learned about the Netflix documentary The Plastic Detox, which explores the health impacts of plastics and microplastics, including fertility concerns.

I haven’t watched it yet.

Not because I don’t want to know, but because this is one of those topics that feels important and, if I’m honest, a little overwhelming.

Like my January post about returns, this falls into the category of not exactly what we want to hear, but probably worth paying attention to anyway.

There is already so much material in the system.

Enough bags. Enough containers. Enough packaging to last us a very long time.

But here’s the tension I can’t stop thinking about: How much responsibility actually belongs to us as individuals?

Another caller on the KQED program admitted to intentionally “wishcycling,” putting questionable items into the recycling bin in hopes that if enough people did it, the system would be forced to improve.

For the record, Recology generally says the opposite: when in doubt, throw it out, because contamination can compromise an entire recycling stream.

I don’t agree with the tactic.

But I deeply understood the frustration underneath it.

We’re often told that solving the plastic problem comes down to individual choices like bringing the reusable bag, remembering the water bottle, recycling better, buying differently.

And yes, those things matter.

But Beth Gardiner said something in the interview that really shifted my thinking. She talked about moving the lens away from personal responsibility and toward a corporate lens.

Because while consumers and municipalities are being asked to manage mountains of plastic waste, the companies producing plastic are planning to double or even triple production.

That feels backwards.

Both Judith Enck and Beth Gardiner spoke about Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), policies that place more responsibility on manufacturers for the waste created by their products and packaging rather than leaving consumers and cities to figure it out alone.

And that got me wondering: whose house are we supposed to be shouting in front of? Where does the greatest impact actually happen?

I don’t have a perfectly tidy answer.

I’m still going to reuse bags in all shapes and sizes.

I’m still going to carry the newspaper sleeves on dog walks.

I’m still going to bring my reusable mug.

But I’m also increasingly convinced that this can’t be solved one reusable grocery bag at a time.

Maybe the goal isn’t perfection. Maybe it’s using what already exists more thoughtfully while also asking bigger questions about the systems producing all of this in the first place.

When we talk about giving things their next highest good, maybe that includes the humble bread bag too.

Resources

Listen:
KQED Forum: How Plastic Took Over the World — And How Big Oil Is Betting on It

Watch:
The Plastic Detox on Netflix

Read:
Plastic Inc. by Beth Gardiner
The Problem with Plastic by Judith Enck

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Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

Because every day is Earth Day.

If we don’t have the earth, we don’t have much. We literally do not have anything to stand on.

I just got back from the East Coast, where spring is doing its thing in that full, generous way. I had lunch by the water near where my parents live, looking down into the inlet, and there they were... three starfish.

I haven’t lived there in a long time. Seeing them again didn’t feel like some sudden comeback story. It just reminded me of what used to be, and how much had been lost along the way.

When I was a kid, you would always spot them on the jetties.

I remember how they felt, slightly rough on top, and how they looked, with what I just learned was not a single shimmering eye, but a madreporite, a kind of tiny sieve that filters seawater and powers their movement. Its own kind of magic.

If you turned one over, a flurry of tiny movement underneath, their little tube feet. Some missing arms, some growing them back. The quiet, incredible resilience of it. The wonder of it.

The sight of them stopped me. Not because everything is fixed, but because it reminded me that change goes both ways. Harm adds up. And so does care.

The wonderful shared this poem with me, originally posted by of The Scrappy Elephant, a creative reuse center in Cenral Virginia, and I haven’t been able to shake it:

Bioluminescence
by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

Sometimes, when I fear
the small light I bring
isn’t big enough or bright
enough, I think of that night
on the beach years ago
when every step I took
in the cool wet sand turned
a glowing, iridescent blue—
and the waves themselves
were a flashing greenish hue—
imagine we could do
what 7.9 billion
one-celled plankton can do—
can shine when it’s dark,
can shine when agitated,
can shine with our own
inner light and trust when we all
bring the tiny light we have,
it’s enough to illumine the next step
in the long stretch of night.

That’s the work.

Not perfection. Not doing everything. Just bringing the light you have, where you are.

Rehoming one item instead of tossing it. Washing something before you donate it. Taking the extra minute to figure out where something actually goes.

It all adds up.

Each (Earth) day. Each (Earth) month. Each (Earth) year.

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Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

I come here multiple days a week with my dog.

I enter from the west end, walk down a steep hill that gets my heart pumping on the way back up. As I descend, it’s like someone turns the volume up on the birds and turns the city sounds way down.

The shadows of the trees stretch across the surface of Pine Lake. Reeds line the perimeter. Two logs hover on the water - four turtles on one, six on the other - all sunning themselves like they reserved the place.

A pair of ducks glides slowly across.

In certain seasons, a great blue heron shows up. Not every day, but often enough that I look for it each time.

The path around the water moves through dappled eucalyptus shade. One side is dirt, bark, leaves, and the aftermath of windy nights. The other is smooth cement, good for bikes, wheelchairs, and easy walking. I appreciate that. It makes access more equitable.

The birds are busy.

I can pick out a few bird calls - Steller’s jays, hawks, red-winged blackbirds - and the rest blend into a pleasant cacophony.

I’ve seen coyotes up on the upper path a number of times.

It’s beautiful here, no matter the weather or the season, it is a sanctuary for me.

Which brings me to a public service announcement:

You can adopt your local park. It is easy. And free.

No official program.
No paperwork.
No training.
No vest.

There’s nothing required except to pick up a little litter while you’re here.

It’s not something to step over.
It’s not something to ignore.
It’s not something that belongs to someone else.

It’s all of ours. Just like the park.

If you’re put off by picking up litter, use a bag. Turn it inside out over your hand and grab what you can. I always have bags with me because of the dog. I also use the blue newspaper sleeves my mom sends from the East Coast — blue for trash, the others for dog poop. Questionable if that keeps us net-zero on the carbon footprint, but at least they’re getting reused.

Or you can bring a glove. Use one of those grabbers. It doesn’t have to be complicated.

There are always the usual suspects:

• Cigarette butts.

• Gum.

• Cough drop wrappers.

• Torn tops of chip bags and snack wrappers — shiny mylar, silver on the inside and glossy graphics on the outside.

• Cans.

• Bottles.

Did I mention cigarette butts?

As I was finishing my walk, thinking about this, I spotted another eyesore on the trail, a bright green and yellow Target wrapper. Branded litter. Sitting there in the shade, like it belongs.

It doesn’t.

So I picked it up.

I have a theory: the cleaner a place appears, the cleaner it stays. The more littered it gets, the more it quietly gives permission for more of the same.

If a few people each pick up a few things, a park stays beautiful.

No sign required.

Sometimes the next highest good is as simple as leaving a place a little better than you found it.

Adopt your local park. I’ll be over here with Stern Grove.

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• Half a can of paint.

• A ziplock bag of batteries.

• Three dead light bulbs.

• Old cables in a knot.

• A mystery bottle labeled something aggressive.

These are the items that don’t quite belong in the trash, but also don’t feel simple enough to deal with today. So they sit, untouched and probably gathering dust.

Good news, below is a straightforward guide to handling the most common “what do I do with this?” items responsibly.

And a reminder: This isn’t about doing it perfectly, just responsibly.

Paint

First things first: check the label. The kind of paint depends on how and where it can be properly disposed of or recycled.

Latex (water-based) paint

• If fully dried, it can often go in the trash (check local rules).

• To dry it out: mix with kitty litter, sawdust, or a paint hardener.

• Recycle through PaintCare. They operate drop-off sites in many states.

Oil-based paint

• Never dump it in the trash.

• Take it to a Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) facility. (insert footnote: Simply Google “household hazardous waste facility near me” and you local options will come up.)

• As mentioned above, many PaintCare sites accept this type of paint..
  

If you have usable paint, post it on your local Buy Nothing Group. Community theaters and reuse centers often love partial gallons.

Batteries

Batteries are one of the biggest hidden fire risks in landfills, especially lithium-ion, so recycling these whenever possible is the safest option across the board. Many retailers like Home Depot have collection bins near the entrance for easy drop off recyling.

Alkaline (AA, AAA)

• In some states, they’re allowed in the trash.

• Recycling is still better when possible, use The Battery Network to find a local drop off location.
  

Rechargeable & lithium-ion

• Must be recycled.

• Tape the terminals before drop-off to prevent fires.

Find drop off locations through The Battery Network.

Household Chemicals

Common household cleaners and chemicals are more than likely tucked under the sink or crowded in a cabinet. We all have them, and they have their uses.

This includes:

• Pesticides

• Pool chemicals

• Solvents

• Automotive fluids

• Strong cleaning concentrates
  

Do not:

• Pour down the drain

• Mix products

• Leave lids loose
  

Instead:

• Take it to your local Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) facility.

• Use Earth911’s extensive recycling database to search by zip code for solutions near you.
  

One last tip: Keep chemicals in their original containers when possible. If something is leaking, place it inside a sealed secondary container.

Light Bulbs

Most residential spaces probably have a limited variety of light bulbs, but it’s important to remember that not all bulbs are equal. There are different types of bulbs and they require different ways to recycle or responsibly dispose of them.

• LED bulbs
  Contain small amounts of metals. Recycle at electronics recyclers or participating retailers.

• CFLs & fluorescent tubes
  Contain mercury. These must go to Hazardous Waste facilities or retail drop-offs.

• Incandescent bulbs
  Technically can go in the trash, but wrap them in paper first to protect workers.

• Holiday lights
  Often accepted seasonally at retailers like Home Depot.

In the event that a CFL breaks:

• Ventilate the room.

• Use gloves.

• Clean with damp paper towels.

• Seal debris in a bag before disposal.

E-Waste (Electronics)

If it plugs in, lights up, or once held data, pause before tossing it. As we’ve now had decades of living with electronic devices and products, recycling retailers and programs are more readily available.

National options include:

• Retailer take-back programs like Best Buy.

• Manufacturer mail-in programs.

• Municipal hazardous waste drop-offs through you local city, town, or county.

• Certified recyclers found via Earth911.
  

Before recycling:

• Perform a factory reset.

• Remove SIM and memory cards.

• Use drive-wiping software when possible.

• Remove batteries if accessible.
  

Have working devices? Consider donating to World Computer Exchange or Cell Phones for Soldiers.

Repair Before Recycling

Before you recycle something electronic or mechanical, ask: Could this be repaired?

Organizations like Repair Cafe and Fixit Clinic host free, volunteer-led repair events across the country. You bring the item, sit with a volunteer and you try to fix it together. There are no guarantees, but often surprising success.

Your public library, tool libraries, and maker spaces frequently host repair days as well. You can Google search using “local”, “repair,” “mending,” or “fix-it” to find events near you.

With Right to Repair laws expanding in states like California, parts and repair information are becoming more accessible again.

Repair is not nostalgic, it’s practical.

A Simple Rule of Thumb

Hazardous items deserve thoughtful handling. Pause before throwing it away if it:

• Contains liquid

• Has a warning label

• Lights up

• Plugs in

• Or contains a battery
  

Remember, this isn’t about perfection, just thoughtfulness. Read from the publication archive to learn more about approachable zero waste living practices you can start today:

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

January is peak returns season, the quiet moment when the things that arrived in December start moving back the other way. Returns feel casual now. A click, a QR code, a drop-off on the way to somewhere else.

But the reality behind them is anything but simple.

This is not a deep dive or a full investigation. Others have done that1 far better than I could. This is a quick and dirty reality check about why returns are no longer the clean backup plan we think they are.

Before we go any further, one thing up front: This is not about perfection. It is about awareness.

The Fairytale Version of Returns (and Why It Is Wrong)

The story most of us are operating under goes something like this:

You buy something.
It does not work.
You return it.
It goes back on the shelf.
Someone else buys it.
No harm done.

That story once made sense. It still makes sense in brick-and-mortar stores, where tried-on shoes get reboxed and reshelved or a sweater gets folded back into a stack.

Online shopping broke that loop.

Today, returns do not simply rewind the clock. They trigger an entirely separate system, often called the reverse supply chain. Returned items have to be shipped again, received somewhere else, sorted, relabeled, stored and then resold, liquidated, donated or destroyed.

The key shift is this: the moment a box is opened, an item often becomes more expensive to deal with than it is worth.

That does not mean someone did anything wrong. It means the system itself is optimized for speed and volume, not for bringing items smoothly back into circulation.

What Actually Happens (A Very Short, Dirty Tour)

Once an item is returned, a few things can happen: Some items are restocked, but many are not.

Large volumes of returns and unsold goods are bundled together and sold to liquidators, often by the pallet, for pennies on the dollar. From there, items may show up at discount outlets, bin stores, flea markets or online resale platforms. Some find second lives. Some do not.

A recent investigation by a writer for Wirecutter, The New York Times’ product recommendation service, bought and unpacked a single 450-pound pallet of returned goods from Amazon and other retailers. What they found was not treasure. It was mostly poorly made clothing, enormous amounts of packaging and nearly 70 pounds of trash generated from that one pallet alone. That pallet represents just one of countless similar pallets moving through the returns system every day.

Clothing is one of the biggest drivers of returns, and quality plays a central role. Many returned clothing items are low quality to begin with—synthetic blends, inconsistent sizing, weak construction—which limits what can realistically be done with them once they leave the original retail stream.

Returns may feel consequence-free to the person making them. Downstream, they are anything but.

One reason I appreciate Wirecutter, is that its entire premise is about choosing the right product the first time. They test, compare and research so consumers don’t have to rely on trial and error or default to returns as part of the process. Fewer returns often start with better information up front.

How We Got Here (and Why It Is So Hard to Stop)

Easy returns did not happen by accident. They are a cornerstone of modern American retail.

Generous return policies lower the risk of buying online and drive sales. Ordering multiples just to see, buying with the expectation of returning later and treating returns as part of the shopping process have all become normalized.

The pandemic accelerated this dramatically. When shopping moved almost entirely online, the easiest way to compare products was to order several and send back the rejects. That habit stuck.

A longer-form look at this system appeared in The New Yorker in 20232, tracing how easy returns became a defining feature of American retail and how a massive industry evolved to manage them. That reporting makes one thing especially clear: even people who understand what happens to returned goods still participate in the system. Returns are deeply embedded in how we shop, how we manage uncertainty and how we protect ourselves from disappointment.

If this feels familiar, the documentary Buy Now! The Shopping Conspiracy explores how modern retail systems are designed to encourage overbuying, disposability and emotional distance from consequences, including returns.

This is not a personal failure. It is a cultural one.

A Lower-Waste Way to Think About Returns

This is not about never returning anything. It is definitely not about getting it right every time. Remember: This is not about perfection. It is about awareness.

Before you buy

Pause. Especially on non-essential items. Ask whether the urgency is real. Do you actually need this overnight or could you wait a few days? Could you buy it in person or give a local business your money instead? That small space between desire and checkout goes a long way.

Borrow or rent when you can. Tools, occasion wear, baby gear, hobby equipment—many things do not need to be owned to be useful.

Measure the space, the item, your body and the clearance it actually needs.

Do a bit of research up front. Dimensions, materials, assembly requirements and how the product actually works in real life matter. Retailers that invest in accurate sizing, clear specifications and honest product education tend to generate fewer returns for a reason.

When possible, buying fewer higher-quality items can reduce returns at the root. Well-made products tend to be more accurately described, last longer and create less disappointment.

I have written before about what I think of as the Triple Constraint Rule: you can rarely have something that is good, fast and cheap all at once. You have to pick two. If you want it good and fast, it will cost you. Good and cheap, plan on waiting. And as I put it in that piece, fast and cheap—do not bother. Returns are often what show up when we try to force all three.

A lot of returns, especially clothing, live squarely in that fast-and-cheap corner. One quiet way people have been stepping out of that loop is by normalizing secondhand. It shifts the math: quality is already known, urgency drops and the system is not being asked to absorb quite so much disappointment.

If you think you might return something

Try to limit bracketing, aka ordering multiples with the expectation of sending most back. When you do need to compare, two options are very different from five. Favor retailers that invest in accurate sizing, detailed specs and honest product education.

If you do return something

Return it quickly. The longer an item sits, the less likely it is to be resold at full value and the more likely it is to be routed into liquidation or disposal.

When possible, use in-store or consolidated drop-off options (like doing Amazon returns at Whole Foods) rather than shipping items individually. Fewer boxes and fewer individual shipments mean less fuel, less packaging and less redundancy moving through the system.

None of this is about shopping sainthood. It is about fewer default decisions and more intentional ones.

Welcome to January

If you have insight or personal experience with this—as a shopper, seller, reseller, warehouse worker or someone dealing with the fallout of returns—I would genuinely love to hear about it. Hit reply or leave a comment and tell me what you are seeing.

Again, I am sorry.

A new year doesn’t have to ask for perfection. It offers an opening to pause, to notice and to try something different the next time you click “buy.”

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

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But too often, the rush to buy something creates clutter, waste and stress that nobody really wants.

That’s why I created this holiday gift guide. I believe sustainable gifting is meaningful gifting. Choosing thoughtful, well-made or experience-based presents means your gift can last beyond the season and leave a lighter footprint on our planet.

My hope is that these ideas inspire you to celebrate in a way that feels generous, joyful and aligned with your values.

What’s inside the guide:

Inside the full guide, you’ll find four categories of gift ideas, plus a few ways to wrap sustainably:

• Thoughtfully made, sustainable products designed to be cherished

• Experiences and services that create memories without adding to the landfill

• Food gifts and local treats that support community and connection

• Donations and “give back” options for the person who truly has everything

• Creative, eco-friendly alternatives to traditional gift wrap

All of the items, brands and organizations featured are ones we at Next Highest Good are personally connected to, collaborate with and use in our daily lives.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by holiday shopping — or simply want a more intentional way to give this year — I hope this guide serves as a helpful, grounding resource.

Download the full 10-page Holiday Gift Guide by clicking below.

Next Highest Good Holiday Gift Guide2025

19.1MB ∙ PDF file

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From our homes to yours, happy holidays. Here’s to a new year filled with generosity purpose.

Lauren Winters West
CEO & Founder, Next Highest Good

The 2026 NRDC Climate Storytelling Fellowship will grant $20,000 each to three writers developing a feature film or television pilot that engages with climate change in a compelling way. The goal: to bring fresh, human, creative perspectives to the biggest issue of our time.

Details and application here. Deadline: November 28, 2025.

The program is a partnership between the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) — one of the most respected environmental advocacy organizations in the world — and The Black List, the platform known for surfacing visionary screenwriters. Together, they’re betting on imagination as a form of activism.

As someone who once worked in the film industry, this hits close to home. I’ve seen firsthand how a single story can ripple through culture and quietly shift the way people see the world. We can’t solve this struggle in the same way we created it. Data and policy matter, but stories reach the heart. Culture moves when people feel the possibility of something better — when they can see it on screen, hear it in dialogue, and imagine themselves inside it.

I also just read a beautiful newsletter from filmmaker Tiffany Shlain — an inspiration of mine — who wrote:

“This is a perfect example of how art plants powerful seeds in your mind that grow into your thoughts and eventually come out in some different permutation.”

Exactly that. Art changes the mental soil we’re all growing in.

As someone who spends her days thinking about waste, reuse and systems change, I’m fascinated by this invitation to shift culture through story. Zero waste, circular economies, creative reuse — these are all acts of imagination. And the right film or series could make those ideas feel not just practical, but inevitable.

If you or someone you know is writing about the environment, sustainability, or simply the human side of climate change, please pass this along. The more we tell stories that expand our sense of what can be saved, the more likely we are to save it.

You can find the full details on the NRDC x Black List Fellowship page.

And as always, I’ll be sharing more on how creative storytelling and zero-waste living intersect at Next Highest Good

The good news? You don’t have to hold onto it all for another year.

Now is the perfect time to donate and rehome your holiday goodies. Giving items a second life before the holiday ensures they can be enjoyed this season — whether it’s a gently used Halloween costume, a Thanksgiving centerpiece, or a string of lights waiting for a new porch to glow on. This is how we pass things on to their next highest good.

(And, if you’re still gathering last-minute Halloween pieces — a costume accessory here, a porch pumpkin there — it’s not too late. Halloween is on Friday, so this week is the perfect moment to add your items to the mix, grab some late-game décor, and keep things out of the landfill in the process.)

Why Timing Matters

Donation centers and creative reuse shops are at their busiest before each major holiday. They need time to process and display items so that someone else can give them a new life. Once the holiday passes, those same items are often too seasonal to be resold or stored efficiently.

By donating now — yes, even Halloween costumes mid-week — you’re helping others decorate sustainably and making space in your own home for what truly brings you joy.

What to Donate Now

As you pull out boxes of decorations, take a mindful inventory. Which pieces do you reach for first? Which ones stay in the bin? The goal isn’t to purge, it’s to let your home reflect your current season of life.

Here are a few examples of what can easily be rehomed this time of year:

• Halloween: costumes, wigs, masks, party décor, treat buckets

• Thanksgiving: seasonal dishware, linens, tablescape items, inflatables

• Winter Holidays: lights, ornaments, wreaths, festive indoor/outdoor décor

• Seasonal Accessories: hats, gloves, scarves, snow gear

And a friendly reminder: the things you already own are good. That ceramic turkey you thrifted three years ago or the snowman platter passed down from your mom still holds value and joy. If they no longer spark joy for you, they’ll absolutely delight someone else this year.

Rehoming with Intention

When deciding what stays and what goes, try thinking beyond “keep or toss.” Most décor can be reused, repaired, or rehomed with a little effort.

If you’re unsure where something belongs, use The Zero Waste Rehoming Decision Tree — a tool I created to help you determine the best next step: reuse, rehome, recycle, or (as a last resort) discard.

Holiday décor is a great place to start. These items often have plenty of life left; it just takes a bit of intentionality to make sure they find their highest and best use.

A Gentle Shift Toward Less Waste

Decluttering before the holidays doesn’t have to feel like a chore. I like to reframe it as an act of generosity. When you pass items along early — whether it’s a ghost costume or a menorah — you give those goods a chance to bring joy again.

From pumpkins to snow globes, every piece you rehome helps create a more sustainable holiday season — for you, your community, and the planet.

I am delighted to introduce Next Highest Good’s Zero Waste Rehoming Decision Tree.

Putting this out into the world has been in my heart for a long time.

This tree is about options, not perfection. It’s here to help you choose what fits your time, values and bandwidth.

At NHG, we believe nearly every object has more life in it — even if that chapter doesn’t include you. If you’ve ever stood over piles of things you do not want but do not know what to do with, this guide is for you.

Think of it like a field map for thoughtful letting go: not toward a singular ideal, but toward circulation. The branches represent different choices: selling, donating, repairing, repurposing - all leading away from the landfill and back into community.

Just because you no longer want an item doesn’t mean it’s not valuable to someone else. One person’s discards really can be another’s treasure.

If you're new here or you missed it the first time around, you might also appreciate The 10 Commandments of Zero Waste Rehoming, which pairs beautifully with this post.

Let’s get into it…

Step 1: Who is this for?

Just because you think it’s trash, doesn’t mean it is. We see this time and time again, and I promise you, there is always a way to find a new home for an unwanted item.

• Ask: Who would want this?

  • e.g. Teachers? Students? Artists/Makers? Cyclists? Decorators? Upcyclers?

• Ask: Where can you reach them?

  • Platforms:

    • Peer-to-Peer Community

      • Buy Nothing

      • Nextdoor

      • Freecycle

      • Your local affinity groups (schools, places of worship, sport clubs, etc.)

    • General Online Marketplaces

      • Craigslist (Free or For Sale)

      • Facebook Marketplace

    • Specialty Resale / Consignment

      • Poshmark

      • The RealReal

      • Chairish

      • ThredUP

      • Consignment stores

    • Reuse & Recycling Centers

      • Local creative reuse centers

      • Ridwell (for specialty streams in some areas)

• Timing Tips:

  • Post for 1–3 weeks, take a break, then repost

  • Match the season:

    • School Supplies → donate in August

    • Halloween → donate costumes and decor in September

    • Christmas → donate in October

Step 2: What’s your urgency?

• Need it out today? → Donation drop off center (if it fits in your vehicle) or hauler for hire (if it’s too big to move solo)

• OK to wait? → Post online or offer to a niche group

• Want to make $$? → Sell (but expect to deal with flakiness)

Explore:

• Specialty buyers (e.g. vintage consignment or collector/hobbyist)

• High School or College departments (e.g. art, theater or upholstery programs)

• TikTok/Instagram DIY flippers

Step 3: What’s your effort level?

• Low → Drop-off donation, stooping* or pass along to someone you know

• Medium → Post online, coordinate pickup/drop-off

• High → Research niche platforms, offer to local communities/organizations, wait for the right person
  

*Note on stooping: When leaving something out on the curb and posting it online, be cautious: many cities restrict this.

Step 4: Can it be rehomed?

We use the word rehome as an umbrella term for: donating, giving away, selling, consigning and repurposing.

• Yes → Go to Step 5

• No →

  • Refer to your local guidelines and recycle if possible

  • If hazardous (e.g. paint, meds, batteries), dispose of via HHW (Household Hazardous Waste) through your local trash service. Note that there are services and people who will use the paint and meds if they are still usable.

  • Consider “Stripping for Parts”, aka, separating materials to be individually recycled through the proper channels

  • If unusable and non-recyclable, landfill

Step 5: Can it be repaired?

• Yes →

  • Are you going to do it yourself?

    • Yes → Repair and reuse or sell. Look for repair cafes in your area.

    • No → Offer it up via your local social media groups and marketplaces as an item that needs to be repaired. Some schools have programs to repair small electronics.

      • When offering up, include: full disclosure of condition and repair details (e.g. listing an Instant Pot on Marketplace with a broken fuse and stating in the listing “this item has a broken fuse and needs to be repaired.”)

      • Bonus: Include research you’ve done (e.g. “Here’s how to refinish a mid-century modern desk”)
        

• No →

  • Refer to your local guidelines and recycle when possible (this includes textiles like clothing and e-waste like electronic home appliances)

  • If hazardous (e.g. paint, meds, batteries), dispose of via HHW (Household Hazardous Waste) through your local trash service

  • Consider “Stripping for Parts”, aka, separating materials to be individually recycled through the proper channels

  • If unusable and non-recyclable, landfill may be the final resort

Step 6: Can it be returned?

If not rehomable, can it be returned to the source?

• Yes →

  • Propane tanks → hardware stores

  • CO2 cylinders → exchange with the manufacturer

  • Nursery pots → local nurseries

  • Hangers → dry cleaners

  • Eyeglasses + cases → optical stores or Lions Clubs

  • Books → Little Free Libraries or Friends of your regional/local library

• No →

  • Refer to your local guidelines and recycle if possible

  • If hazardous (e.g. paint, meds, batteries), dispose of via HHW (Household Hazardous Waste) through your local trash service

  • Consider “Stripping for Parts”, aka, separating materials to be individually recycled through the proper channels

  • If unusable and non-recyclable, landfill may be the final resort

Step 7: Can we avoid acquiring it in the first place?

• Yes! → Consider renting, borrowing or sharing

  • Especially for baby/kids gear, party supplies, tools, etc.

  • No shame, just smarter use of community resources

• No →

  • Normalize and buy secondhand, most items we desire for most things can be found.

Connecting Back to the Roots

Just like the real thing, this decision tree has many branches and they all do not lead to the same place.

Some paths circle back into reuse, some stretch out into new owners and a few end in landfill as a last resort. The point isn’t perfection, it’s direction: a way to navigate choices thoughtfully, step by step, so the majority of items stay in circulation rather than being cut off too soon.

We hope you use this tree as a guide to grow your own zero waste habits and to remind yourself that every rehoming choice is part of a larger ecosystem. Stay tuned for a visual of the Zero Waste Rehoming Decision Tree coming soon!

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

At Next Highest Good we talk a lot about rehoming but sometimes, the next best home is a temporary one.

The sharing economy is defined as an economic system in which assets and services are shared between individuals, usually peer-to-peer. Sometimes free, sometimes paid, usually online. You know the big ones - Uber, Airbnb - but what about the everyday systems of sharing that are already all around us?

Here are a few worth celebrating and supporting:

Gear
Borrow gear at Sports Basement (yes, they rent it!), or go local with free neighborhood groups. And, I just learned about Cloud of Goods with their tagline “everything you rent delivered to wherever you are: wheelchairs, strollers, scooter rentals & more”.

Tool

s
Home Depot rents them. So does the Berkeley Public Library Tool Lending Library - one of the first in the nation, guess which one.

Books
Little Free Libraries are quietly building equity, access, and community -over 42 million books shared through 200,000+ libraries in 128 countries.
Click here to start one in your neighborhood.

Clothing
I’d only heard of Rent the Runway, but it turns out there are at least seven clothing rental companies now - for all sizes and budgets. More on textiles and reuse in a future post.

Homes
Airbnb, VRBO, HomeExchange. We recently used TrustedHousesitters for a family trip. We paid a modest annual fee, and a vetted sitter stayed at our place in exchange for caring for our dog, cat and plants at no additional cost. Everyone wins.

Transportation
You’ve probably used Lyft, Uber or Zipcar. But in some places, you can now rent e-bikes and scooters by the hour.

Skills + Labor
Need a helping hand? Try Thumbtack for peer-to-peer skills and services - from mounting shelves to mending clothes.
Need muscle and a vehicle? That’s where Lugg and Truqit come in - the first offers same day on-demand mover and/or delivery with a driver and the second a truck for you to drive.

So… is this the sharing economy? Or is it just people being resourceful, neighborly and intentional?

Either way, I’m down.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

My answer: a lot!

Let’s be honest, selling clothes isn’t just about making money. It’s about doing the math on your time, your energy, your expectations, your availability and your physical space.

Start by asking yourself:

• Do you want a fast turnaround?

• Do you want to track who buys what?

• Do you want cash or store credit?

• Can you store items for a while if they don’t sell?

• Do you have the space (and bandwidth) to keep them organized?

• How much money are you actually hoping to make?

The Condition Test

Before we talk about options, check the quality. If it’s stained, full of holes (where they weren’t intended), heavily pilled or off trend, it probably won’t sell. But that doesn’t mean it’s trash. More on this in a minute.

Seven Options for Selling Clothes

1. In-Person Resale

Crossroads Trading, Buffalo Exchange and local resale shops offer on-the-spot payouts or store credit.

A few musts:

• Must be basics or

  seasonal — don’t bring sweaters in summer (even in San Francisco).

• Must be clean, stylish and in good shape.

They’re selective, so don’t take it personally if something gets passed over.

Cash vs. Store Credit — Know the Difference

Most resale shops give you more in-store credit than in cash. As of now:

• Crossroads Trading:

  • 50% in store credit

  • 30% in cash

• Buffalo Exchange:

  • 50% in store credit

  • 25% in cash

Only choose store credit if you actually like shopping there. Otherwise, take the cash. Just know it won’t be much unless you’re bringing in a lot of inventory that they are interested in.

For just a few items? You might be better off donating, swapping or listing online.

2. Online Platforms

These work well if you like being hands-on:

• Poshmark, Depop, Mercari – you post, you price, you ship.

• Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, BuyNothing – great for quick local turnover or zero-waste gifting.

Note: BuyNothing doesn’t allow money exchange. It’s about community re-use and giving freely. That’s the whole point.

3. ThredUp

Ilike ThredUp. I’m not much of a retail shopper — most of my wardrobe comes from clothing swaps — but I’ll send ThredUp a load a few times during the year. Then in winter, I’ll check and find a $102 credit. I’ll buy a Marc Jacobs cashmere sweater for $75, maybe spend a few bucks and feel great about it.

ThredUp highlights:

• Less hassle

• Slower turnaround

• Not a big profit, but a gentle cycle of reuse

4. High-End Resale

If you’ve got luxury or designer items, consider:

• The RealReal

• eBay (if you’re up for managing listings)

Designers and brands like Vince, Miu Miu, Isabel Marant, A.P.C., or similar fall into this category. These pieces hold value and deserve a second (or third) life with someone who’ll wear them.

5. Brand-Specific Return Programs

More and more brands are taking back what they’ve sold:

• lululemon Like New

• H&M Garment Recycling (yes, it’s the IKEA of clothing and I stand by it)

• Urban Outfitters’ Nuuly Thrift (just heard about this — worth keeping an eye on)

These programs usually offer store credit and some take things even if they’re worn out.

6. Sporting & Kids’ Gear

• Sports Basement Preloved for outdoor gear, athletic wear, and more

• Once Upon a Child, GoodBuy Gear for gently used baby and kid clothes

These help you recirculate short-use items that kids outgrow or that no longer fit your lifestyle.

7. Clothing Swaps

An often-overlooked favorite.

Swaps are real. They work. And when they’re good, they’re great.

It’s a feedback loop: if you score a Diane von Furstenberg wrap dress and wear it 16 times, you’re going to bring your A-game next time. Designer sunglasses? A leather jacket you once loved? Bring them! The better stuff you contribute, the better the swap becomes for everyone.

That’s what keeps the vibe elevated. It’s generosity in motion, and it raises the bar.

What if it’s not sellable? Textile recycling & fabric reuse

If a piece isn’t in good enough condition to sell or gift (think stains, holes, stretched-out knits or just plain tired fabrics) consider textile recycling instead of tossing it in the trash.

That includes:

• Threadbare tees

• Holey socks (no, not the cool intentional ones)

• Single gloves or socks

• Or that one rogue fishnet stocking that’s been riding solo since 2018

You get the idea. If it’s missing its match, there’s still a chance for reuse.

Many cities have textile recycling drop-off bins (SF’s Recology is one), and brands like H&M, Levi’s and For Days accept worn-out textiles.

If the fabric is beautiful (think wool, silk, linen, denim) offer it to local artists, quilters or teachers. There’s a whole world of people hungry for raw material.

Textiles don’t belong in a landfill. Even when they’re done in your closet, they’re not done done.

So what’s the best method?

There’s no one-size-fits-all.

Selling clothes is like filtering through a funnel:

• At the top: high-end resale

• In the middle: curated resale shops and online platforms

• At the base: swaps, gifting, donation, textile recycling

My advice?

Pick one or two paths that match your values and your schedule.

Set a time limit: how long are you willing to hold on to an item before you let it go? Then move it along.

Clothes are meant to be worn, not accumulated.

P.S. Got a resale win or favorite way to rehome clothes? Drop it in the comments and let's crowdsource the wisdom.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

I’ve had an Apple Pencil for almost two years. I bought it during a phase when I was trying to go paperless — taking client intake notes on an iPad felt like it could be my new normal. But now AI takes those notes for me and I can type as I go. That meditation practice? Really helping. 🙃

Anyway, back to the pencil. It’s barely used. It just sits there in a little cup on my desk.

But I still have the box.

I’m not usually a box saver. But something about this one made me keep it. Maybe I thought I’d resell it and it felt like the box was part of the value. Plus, it came with a replacement tip and I couldn't think of a spot where I could store that tiny thing and recall its location.

But here’s the thing: I don’t want this pencil anymore. I know it has value. I don’t want to toss it in the donation bin. But I also don’t really want to go through the effort of listing it, photographing it, describing it, managing messages, coordinating a pickup and wondering whether it was all worth $50. Which it probably is. If I ask someone on my team to do it for me, will I still come out ahead?

Why is it so hard to just… let it go?

There’s a sticky emotional space between knowing something has value and not having the capacity (or desire) to extract it. You want it gone but you can’t quite donate it. You could sell it but it’s just annoying enough that it sits there instead. And time (read: years) passes.

You might be:

• Frustrated that you didn’t use it like you thought you would

• Feeling guilty that you spent the money

• Tired of the clutter but attached to the story

• Overwhelmed by the steps involved in posting it

Whatever the reason, you're not alone. That’s why we use “rehoming” as an umbrella category. Selling counts as rehoming. So does gifting. So does putting something on the curb. The goal is: somebody else uses this thing.

And when that happens? It can actually feel really good.

The Joy of Reuse

We see it all the time in our work. One client was letting go of her teenage son’s cowboy boots. They happened to fit one of our team members perfectly — and I’ve seen her wear them for years since. Another time we rehomed a Mahjong set from one client to another who now uses it for her game nights.

There’s a real magic when something gets a second life.

Organizations like The Reuse Alliance (shoutout to Phoebe and her team in Petaluma!) are working hard to make reuse the default — not the exception. Reuse keeps items out of the landfill, supports local economies and connects people through stuff they already have.

But Should You Sell It?

Sometimes yes. But it depends.

Let’s take two examples:

• A $30 backpack

• A $500 patio set

How fast do you need it gone? How much time are you willing to spend? What condition is it in? Would you need a larger vehicle than you have to donate it? Can it be donated? Are you hoping to make money or just feel like it went to a good home?

If you’re only selling it to try to “get your money back” ask yourself if that’s worth the energy. You’re moving or purging time might matter more than cash.

If it’s in excellent condition, clean and well‑photographed you might be able to sell it quickly. If not it may just sit.

Condition Counts

Please — no broken zippers, peeling faux leather or mystery stains. If it’s ripped where it shouldn’t be or otherwise wholly broken it won’t pass muster at most donation centers (Goodwill doesn’t want your broken toaster. Remember the Ten Commandments of Zero Waste!). In those cases recycle textiles or hard goods through the proper streams instead of clogging up the donation bin and adding externalized costs to your local nonprofits.

Where to Sell (a Real Talk Rundown)

Each platform has its own vibe. Here’s a quick snapshot:

• Craigslist: Great for furniture, tools and household goods. The local old‑school still works. Best for large or bulky items.

• Facebook Marketplace: Huge audience, decent turnover. Prepare for some flakes.

• Buy Nothing: NOT for sales but amazing for local rehoming and community building. You’re limited to one group unless you donate (which we recommend). Support this movement. I received nothing for this endorsement.

• Poshmark: Fashion resale. Takes effort — best if you’re doing volume, and well-known brands do best. You ship it yourself.

• ThredUP: Send in a big bag of clothes and the platform decides what to resell. You get a little store credit. I use mine for sweaters in December.

• The RealReal: Designer items only. Great if your item meets their criteria. You’ll get less than you might on your own but it’s easy.

• Chairish (yes spelled like chair): For upscale furniture and home décor. It’s curated and lovely. Expect higher‑end listings.

• FreeCycle: The predecessor to Buy Nothing. A true gift‑economy network for local swaps and rehoming. Great for anything you want to give away quickly.

OfferUp LetGo and other niche swap sites have either folded or faded — but let us know if you’ve got a favorite local resale or OG swap group in your area! I still remember the thrill of getting a little wooden bowling set for my kid through a beta version of a local reuse platform back when Adam Werbach was first talking about how sharing would change the way we shop. And he was right.

The Template (It Helps)

Use this format to reduce the amount of back‑and‑forth and weed out flaky buyers:

Item Name
Short clear title

Description
Include

• Size/Dimensions

• Condition (e.g. “Like new” “Used but works well” etc.)

• Any notable quirks (honesty builds trust!)

• Pickup or delivery details

Photos
Well‑lit (I cannot emphasize this enough!) shots on a clean background. Multiple angles. No clutter.

Price
Fair market value. If you’re flexible say “OBO” (or best offer).

Message Guidelines
You can kindly add:
“If this post is up it’s still available. Please only ask serious questions — no ‘Is it available?’ please.”

Final Thoughts

If your item is worth $50+ and you don’t want to post it yourself, get someone else to help or hire a virtual assistant. We do this for clients all the time.

And if you’re feeling uncertain about letting something go remember this: stuff flows.
The universe does provide — not always on demand but often when you least expect it.

I’ve received:

• A perfect picnic table

• A brand‑new heated mattress pad

• A gorgeous leather jacket I would’ve never bought

• More than one child’s toy I hadn’t even started looking for yet

So maybe selling it gets you cash. Or maybe giving it away gets you peace. Either way it moves. And that’s the win.

Coming Soon: A full breakdown of our Zero Waste Rehoming Decision Tree plus tips on how to donate better faster and with less drama. Subscribe to stay in the loop.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

For me the memory evokes images of Fred and Wilma Flintstone, Looney Tunes’ Road Runner, Hanna Barbara and Tom and Jerry. But now that I have gone down the web (Bugs) bunny hole I see this “collab" idea dates back to a sponsorship of Howdy Doody TV show.

Welch’s first introduced their grape jelly jars designed to double as drinking glasses in the 1950s. Throughout the 50s, 60s, and 70s, the company targeted children with glass vessels featuring popular characters from Davy Crockett, The Flintstones, Archie, Warner Brothers and Peanuts.These dual duty items contained a built in advertising and promotional function and the jars became collectible items.

Production of these glass sets ended in 1978 due to changes in glass manufacturing technology. Dan Dillon, Welch’s vice president of marketing, explained that the older full-press glass technology was replaced by a thinner glass made with press-and-blow technology, which caused the jars to chip when the traditional pry-off metal lids were removed. This led Welch’s to switch to screw-top lids, which made the jars less appealing as drinking glasses.

In 1988, Welch’s revived the jelly-jar-as-drinking-glass concept using new plastic technology, allowing the jars to hold jelly and then be reused as drinking glasses without the screw-top ridges. The new designs featured contemporary characters such as Dr. Seuss, The Muppets, The Lion King and Pokémon.

On an organizing project a few weeks back a client had a treasure trove of shipping and gift boxes in a variety of shapes and sizes that she had been collecting since, wait for it… 2015. She had, of course, stored the boxes and she had also moved them to her current home from a previous one. She was now ready to liberate the space they were taking up by recycling them. But, you know what?! We used many of them as organizing containers in her pantry and utility area and it completely worked.

Sure, you can buy bins and organizers in myriad shapes, sizes, styles and materials. The Container Store depends on it. (For the fiscal year ending March 30, 2024, the company reported annual sales of $847.8 million.) Though, you can also use what arrives at your door or what you already have i.e. shoe boxes or old jelly jars.

Another thing LOTS of people keep is boxes. This month alone we had three projects where the team spent a significant amount of time breaking down cardboard from not only the garage but also the living room, office, hallway and kitchen. I have a future post in the hopper on when to keep manufacturer boxes as it relates to increasing the value of items you plan to resell.

As we learned from our short Welch’s lesson (along with my sweet and salty letter last month), many manufacturers are unfortunately no longer thinking about how their packaging can be reused and repurposed. But I’m here to remind you that you can in fact get creative with sustainability.

We are all about reuse, and a rule of thumb we love is: use it (at least) twice.

Here are a few other ideas for repurposing items in your home that may at first seem like throwaways:

• Produce twist ties can be reused for purposes around the home like organizing cords, labeling items and in the garden for plant support or tying up outer leaves of vegetables.

• Newspaper and bread bags are great for dog poop (shout out to

• The small elastic bands that come with Smartwool socks are my cat’s favorite thing to fetch and play with

• Jelly jars can store dry pantry staples like flour, baking soda, and spices

• Broken down cardboard can be used for kids’ school/art projects (aka poster board replacement) or turned into signs for community rallies

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

Please, will you consider implementing product packaging so that once we have extracted your goods, we can repurpose the entire box for additional uses?

Some of you are doing this well. This is you, manufacturers of sunglasses. Many of you, not so much. Sure the lids from boxes from the Apple products are excellent but have you ever tried to remove the molded parts from the bottom? It is paper so you would think you could do it but no, you cannot. And if it does come out without you cursing and/or sweating, it is not a good look and/or it is uneven or wonky inside.

Imagine this: the molded pieces inside the boxes pop out cleanly so we could utilize your sturdy, durable and nice-looking packaging byproduct for a second and third purpose. You put so much effort into designing and manufacturing, don’t you think the packaging deserves a life beyond the big reveal?

Some practical and creative examples of those second and third purposes include:

1. Organization and Storage

2. Gifts and Craft uses

3. Resale and Shipping

4. Creative Uses such as pinhole cameras and a planter box for seedlings

I see this as a quadruple win:

1. There is loads of goodwill in the thoughtfulness of your packaging design

2. Your branding lives on as a visual in our homes and work spaces and could maybe even become a collectible

3. Overall waste is reduced

4. This negates the need to purchase new bins to satisfy our need to corral our stuff

Thank you for your consideration,

Lauren

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

We see this a lot around cities, people leaving seemingly random stuff on the corner, leaning up against fire hydrants and municipal trash cans.

I recall from my days living in Manhattan finding a lobster trap (yes, you read that correctly: a lobster trap) on West 4th Street and dragging it home, stopping many times because it literally had bricks in it. How this thing ended up on the street in New York freaking City I have no idea.

I bought a piece of glass for it and we used it for years as a coffee table. One of my cats loved to crawl through the netted hole and sleep inside the trap. My college besties and I still talk about that special kitty. Heavy sigh #thecatsthatIhaveloved

Anyway, nowadays we call this a “ground score”, which the Urban Dictionary defines as

ground score

adj. anything cool found on the ground

v. the act of finding something cool on the ground

I imagine many of us can recall something we have found and kept as our own. Or, more likely, beloved items we have lost. I still think about a pink suede cap I lost in a London nightclub in 1993. When it rained, rose colored drops dripped off the brim.

Those are things genuinely lost and found. What I am musing about here is something else.

It is my hypothesis that people leave goods on the street because they believe it has value, someone will want it and either they don’t know what to do with it or are not willing to deal with it or any combination of the two.

This is, of course, not legal. Our municipalities do not want us to put anything out without going through the proper channels.

In San Francisco, residential Recology customers receive, at no additional charge, two curbside ”Bulky Item Recycling” collections per year for large items - like old furniture, appliances or mattresses - that don’t fit or belong in the bins. It is super easy to schedule and modify your curbside pickup. Here is a link to view the full list of accepted items and learn more.

People often leave items and furniture on the side of the road because they may be trying to dispose of it cheaply or because they are hoping someone else will take it, or who knows why, I can only speculate. And I wonder if people knew that there were places you could bring these items if they would leave it on the corner anyway.

I’ve been cataloging this for a while now, taking photos of medical equipment like crutches and a commode, pet carriers and cones, kid gear such as the wagon and car seat and so much more.

Check out the “free box” we came across in Tokyo late last year. If our 10 days touring around the country is statistically significant (it isn’t, humor me), this is uncommon in Japan. I just had to poke through it! And you know what? In that box, I found postcards that I grabbed for my son to use as thank you cards. And use them he did!

And this isn’t just unique to my city. The Instagram account @stoopingnyc is entirely dedicated to items left and found on the city streets of New York. Perhaps even lobster traps are still discovered today?

“The account is run by a couple based in Brooklyn who prefer to remain anonymous. The idea started thanks to their son, “a wonderful little guy with special needs who loves to take walks.” Touring their neighborhood on foot, the family would “consistently see all these amazing treasures that people were just putting out on the curb waiting for somebody to collect, or for sanitation to take away.” What started out as a hobby has become a real service to the community. Read the full article here.

“An Inside Look at the Instagram That Highlights New York’s Best Stoop Finds“

When it comes to finding the balance between respecting the rules of your municipality, the convenience of just “let me get rid of this now” and actually being of service to the members of your community, this could be a tight needle to thread.

But! There is a great option with the Buy Nothing Project, a web-based network of over 245,000 gifting communities around the globe, where everything is freely-given and freely-received, without any expectation of reward or compensation.

Posting goods on Buy Nothing will allow you to reduce waste by giving away what you no longer need; save money by getting what you want or need for free; and build and foster community while you meet neighbors and share creatively.

To get more information and join your local community, click here.

The fact is the best way to rehome specific goods to their highest and best use is to give them directly to the organizations and people in need of those particular items.

In the Bay Area, you can donate gently used medical equipment to The ReCARES Network which has been collecting, redistributing and encouraging reuse of medical equipment and supplies throughout the Bay Area since 1996. Admittedly they have limited hours, but they do have multiple locations. And isn’t it worth it to make time to drop off that cane, shower chair and cold therapy machine gathering dust since the knee surgery a few years back?

As evidence that resources for this category exist in other parts of the country and not just in our SF Bay Area bubble, here is a resource that serves individuals and families in Philadelphia and South Jersey offering refurbished home medical equipment: Goodwill Home Medical Equipment.

As for the pet supplies, you can donate pet food and gently used goods in-store at Petco and PetSmart locations as well as your local SPCA, Humane Society and shelters.

That said, Buy Nothing can serve as your one stop shopping rehoming for all the items covered here as well as myriad other things including lemons from someone's tree and half of a birthday cake. Seriously. Check it out, you will be glad you did.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

After graduating from college, I started working freelance in the film business in New York City on independent movies, commercials and lots of music videos (The Notorious B.I.G., LL Cool J, Busta Rhymes, Janet Jackson, Mariah Carey, Kenny G, Masaharu Fukuyama, to name a few). But, that is a story for another time.

I’m bringing this up to share a rule I first learned working in production all those years ago that has been proven true time and again both in my life and in my business. A quick internet search later, I learned that this is called the “iron rule” or the “triple constraint”, the latter moniker making much more sense to me. Its origins are unclear but it has been around since at least the 1950s, a noteworthy time period I will get to in a future post.

Here is the triple constraint rule in a nutshell: good, fast, cheap - choose two.

You get it, if you want it good and fast, it will cost you. Good and cheap, plan on waiting. Fast and cheap… don’t bother. I am tempted to get into a piece about “fast fashion” and “fast furniture” here but I will leave that for a future article as well.

**

Last month, my 13 year-old son was moving his monitor on his desk and I do not know exactly what happened but he irreparably damaged the screen. With distress in his early teen voice, he called me into his room and motioned toward the otherwise beautiful impression the crack made directly across the central panel.

Instant gratification alert! The next moment he was Googling for a replacement and nagging his mama for a decision as to when he could pick up the new machine. I understood. He was upset. He likes to game, does so often and the monitor was central to the setup.

As calmly as I could I reminded him of my values and that buying something new immediately wasn’t necessarily going to be the way this would go down. He was not pleased.

But I got him to sit next to me and do a search on Facebook Marketplace for monitors that checked the box on our criteria. His: curved, 27 inches. Mine: within city limits, previously owned.

Several came up! We Googled the ones that were listed for sale to see what their original prices were and the age of each item, which gave us more info to ask specific questions of the seller. I emailed each of the folks, a little worried that they wouldn’t respond as quickly as I needed, but that was not a challenge we faced. One wonders if someone selling a monitor is someone who is actually on Facebook regularly enough to respond to an inquiry to their sale post.

Secondhand Tip: I have seen the perfect thing for sale on Facebook Marketplace and contacted the person to no avail. No response, ever. It happens. It’s disappointing. But keep on looking and your item will likely surface sooner or later. Or you will move on and never miss that thing you were sure you could not live without.

The bottom line is that we got one of those monitors. It was one that retailed for more than double the price of the new one that he wanted. It had sound, a feature he, in his frustration, told me he didn’t even want, but then the next day when his friends sat around his desk and the bing-bonging was going off, he was undeniably stoked.

I was sharing the story with a friend, when that old adage from film days came to me. But, I realized, this actually was the best of all scenarios. There were zero constraints! The monitor we got was better, less expensive and quickly accessible - it only took me 15 minutes to drive from home the following day to pick it up. Ok, 35. Five minutes to transact between the rides.

Win-win plus win as far as I’m concerned. No packaging. No shipping. One guy unloaded his older monitor, made a few bucks and we got one that was new (to us), less expensive, better and “arriving” the next day.

You may remember number five from the “10 Commandments of Zero Waste Rehoming” that normalizing secondhand serves to circulate goods and build community. In this case, we didn’t become friends with our seller, but I did notice his next-door neighbor with a lot of boxes and chatted him up, dropping off a business card, since hiring professional organizers to help you unpack is some of the best money you will ever spend.

Speaking of boxes, our new monitor did come in its original box complete with Styrofoam inserts housing the individual parts. I am not a box keeper, but MANY people are. There are guidelines for when to keep the box and when to reuse or recycle it. Some say that people are more likely to buy secondhand products that come in their original box because the box provides a sense of authenticity and quality, and can indicate that the item has been well-maintained and is in good condition, making buyers more confident in their purchase.

Meh. I am not convinced. If there is interest, dear readers, let me know. I will be happy to extrapolate on that topic another time. As for the Styrofoam, that I added to my next Ridwell pickup. I recycled the box.

We also got a life lesson about negotiation. The guy was asking $100 for the monitor that sold at retail a year and a half or so ago for $269. My son immediately pinged back asking when was the soonest he could pick it up. I admonished him, “No, no now he knows how badly you want it”. I took over the communications, responding with “Will you take $75?”. He responded that he was ok with $85. I said done and done and we set a pickup appointment.

Once the monitor was set up, with a friend in front of it, I pulled my son aside to revisit our initial conversation mainly so I could recall this scenario for when (not if) something like this happens again. You know what he said? He said, “I told you we should’ve looked on Facebook Marketplace, you should trust me sometimes, Mom.”

Hilarious.

Jokes were made. Lessons were learned. Boxes were checked.

Good? Check.

Fast? Check.

Cheap? Check.

Turns out you can have all three.

Post Script: Last weekend, I heard the song for the very first music video I worked on: “Juicy” by The Notorious B.I.G. coming from my son’s room. I hustled in there to find it was coming from the montior. Now that really brings it full circle for me.

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Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

I started Next Highest Good Professional Organizing with a goal to uphold the highest environmental standards and model business practices that truly care for our communities and our Earth. And throughout my decade of daily practice and leadership, I have created the 10 Commandments of Zero Waste Rehoming as a guidepost for the daily choices and actions we can make to better our planet and society. 

1. Your Stuff is Good

I hate the idea of the haulers calling your stuff “junk”. That pisses me off. Just because you no longer want, need, or use it, why is it now junk? That is offensive. And rude. The fact of the matter is that one person’s trash is indeed another one's treasure. This is proven true time and again. In my work as a professional organizer, I am consistently surprised: the Instant Pot in need of a new fuse, the broken (!) laundry drying rack, the extremely stinky canvas tent… we have rehomed and upcycled all of these plus so so so much more. It takes extra effort and work but there are places and people who will take what on the surface may be and frequently is considered junk. 

2. Donate with Dignity

We all know you can donate your books, clothes, and household items *in good condition* to myriad places including big name places like Goodwill and Salvation Army. No problem. But what about the mildew smell on those books, the chipped ceramic plates, the worn-out clothing, not to mention the single socks, undies, and bras? Actually, it turns out, Goodwill does not want your broken toaster, so not all your stuff is good at all times. Hopefully it was before it wore out or broke. The point is this: be discerning.

Before dropping off your boxes of “donations”, please consider: would you offer it to someone whose opinion matters to you? There are plenty of other options if you have items that are not - in the condition they are currently in - good candidates for donation. 

Donating with dignity also means donating your good stuff in a timely fashion. Exactly nobody wants a base for a Christmas tree in January. Dropping off snow clothes, Halloween costumes/decor, school supplies, and other seasonal items in advance of that time of year will not only lighten the load on your local thrift stores, it will increase the chances your beloved goods will find a new home sooner than later.

Besides all that, donating with dignity has a deeper meaning. There are many organizations that work with previously unhoused people who have moved into a new home and are living out of trash bags and sleeping on the floor. Would you feel good about giving them your worn or broken cast-offs? You might, but wouldn't it feel much better to offer them a matching set of dishes free from chips and cracks? That way you fulfill their very real need for dishes but also the dignity that comes with a table set with matching plates and cutlery.   

3. Rehome It

Consider the language we see and hear so often around purging, decluttering, and organizing our homes and work spaces: “get rid of it”, “pitch it”, “dump it”, “junk it". Even “donate it” seems to have become a nebulous term that makes people feel better or not have to think about the choice they made in buying that thing - banana holder, anyone? - in the first place.

Take the concept of rehoming to heart like you would before you decide to get a pet. That is where you may have first heard the term "rehoming". Use this language in your process. When you think about rehoming goods that pays respect to these very items that you kept and used in your home or work space. Rehoming frames the way you think about your stuff – and about new items you may be considering bringing into your home. A few questions to consider:

• How is it packaged and what will I do with the box, bag, crate it arrives in?

• Will it need care?

• What will I do with the item when I no longer want, need or use it?

You don't just go out and pick up a dog, cat, bunny, hamster or snake on a whim. Well, most of us don't at least. You think about it, mull it over and consider the implications of inviting this new family member in. Where will they sleep, eat, how will they manage when I am not around to feed or walk them. 

Now I don’t mean to say that a lamp or shoe rack can be compared to a living thing but if you think about the impact that all our purchases have on our Earth…

Yes, you guessed it! The Earth is the ultimate living thing and if we keep taxing her at this pace, she is going to make life difficult, to say the least. Of course, it is not the same but you get the point:

• If we each consider the endgame *before* we make the purchase, we can start to see all the costs. The real cost of goods is the collective environmental impact of the manufacturing process and its pollution, labor conditions and wages, packaging, shipping, and disposal of many items that come from overseas. 

4. Don't be a Wishcycler

Recycling is bullshit, you say. And I say, you are right! The national recycling rate is... wait for it, a single digit, 6%. Eek! The rules are different everywhere you go. What do those numbers in the chasing arrows mean anyway? I hate to say it, but recycling is bullshit! But, do it anyway, please. Thank you.

Wishcycling is the disposal of consumer waste in a recycling bin in hopes of it being recycled when it cannot or is unlikely to be recycled. Wishcycling occurs because people are unfamiliar with what can be recycled or they want to believe that the items they put in the recycling bin can be made into something useful.

For now, recycling is the only thing we have got. You need to learn the rules where you live and share them in your community. If your municipality does not have it posted or easily accessible on their website, ask for it. If there is no response or unsatisfactory information, ask again.

The fact of the matter is, the higher quality their recycling product is, the better it is for your town or city. Meaning, that the more contaminants, non-recyclable products or mixed recyclable items you have, the less it is worth to the organizations that take our recycling.

Here is the point: know your rules and recycle what you can in your area. If it can't be recycled in your area, consider not buying it or moving (I am only half kidding, I would have trouble living in a place that did not have the robust recycling, composting and zero waste efforts our coop Recology does here in San Francisco. It is - seriously - one of the reasons I moved here.)

I’ve heard it said that the best recycling bin is an empty one. Even though it is BS, still we should do it. 

5. Normalize Secondhand

There is so much product out in the world already! Cool stuff, brand new goods, tags still on. Why pay retail? It is a win-win. Let’s normalize secondhand goods for all things like clothing, luxury items, home and sporting goods.

There is an inspiring movement among bigger retailers to make secondhand items normal and accessible. Brand names like Home Depot, Patagonia, Apple, lululemon, H&M, and many others are offering take-back programs. And if you are into luxury goods, you surely know about The RealReal and Chairish.

It is far from perfect but if you know what you want, you can get great stuff at a fraction of the retail price for items, right from your sofa, by perusing online consignment and thrift sites like ThredUp, Poshmark and Depop to name a few.

Have you ever been to clothing exchange or book swap? What a beautiful was to circulate goods and build community. More on this in an upcoming post.

The fact is we cannot get out of the environmental stress we are under in the same way we got into it. We need to rethink and reimagine framing things as “used”. 

 6. The Next Highest Good

When rehoming, think about and focus on the highest and best use for all the things you no longer want or need. Sure, the bottle caps and toilet paper tubes can go in the recycling bin (by this point, I am sure you have checked the guidelines in your area) but wouldn’t a better use be materials for 3D art at your local preschool or community center, saving them the expense of pristine goods and building community in the process? Ask yourself who would really appreciate this thing or which group could make great use of these items… today.

Time is a great guideline in rehoming items to their next highest good. You could donate the high end bicycle gear to your local thrift shop to get shelved and await their next owner but you know who would put that fancy stuff to use right away? The local bicycle club that supports new members who are gearing up.

And what about the layers of hypotheticals? We had one client say: “My daughter might want that crib for her baby if she has one.” I asked: “Is she planning to have a child soon? Will she want it if she does? Would you want to put your newborn baby grandchild into a crib that has been in your musty basement for 10 years?” That made her think. Too many ifs! I call it “layers of hypotheticals”. Do you find yourself stacking up the “ifs”?

A lot of us hold onto things because we might need it someday. But, the fact of the matter is, there are people who need that thing, uh, yesterday! Give it to someone who needs it now or at least can definitely use it sooner than “maybe” or “in a few years”. 

7. Think Globally, Act Locally and Support Your Community

There is so much value in taking things to the local level. You are able to support your direct community, form relationships with your neighbors or keep goods in a family. Freeing up space in your garage and getting to know your neighbors at the same time? Yes, please.

The top three platforms for rehoming locally are Next Door, Buy Nothing, and Facebook Marketplace. Outside of those, consider your affinity groups like places of worship, schools, after school programs, sports clubs and teams, community centers and colleges, etc.

By making connections locally, you can learn and then spread the word about your local thrift stores, creative reuse centers, salvage yards and other places to rehome items. 

8. Repair It

Did you know there are laws in place that protect manufacturers by preventing some goods from ever being repaired? For 15 years now, Repair Café has grown into a worldwide movement that strives to preserve repair skills in society and to promote more repairable products.

Besides the Netherlands, there are Repair Cafés in Belgium, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and dozens of other countries around the world including India and Japan.

Signed by Governor Gavin Newsom, the Right to Repair Act (SB 244) took effect on July 1, 2024, making California the third U.S. state, following New York and Minnesota, to enact legislation aimed at creating a marketplace for consumers to repair their electronics and appliances.

As of this writing, there are over 2,500 Repair Cafés worldwide. Visit one in your area or start one yourself - yet another way to foster community in your area. 

9. Return It

Yes, you can give things back. In fact, vendors love to have their items returned. It saves them money and time. Items like:

• Dry cleaner hangers

• Scuba and propane tanks

• Carpet and fabric samples

• Plastic berry baskets

Your returns save resources for Mama Earth and resources for small businesses.

Returns are not just from supplies. Keep an eye out for a future article featuring a heart-warming example in the form of the custom map of Chicago that made it back into the hands of the charity who created it, many many years earlier. Upon arrival they called it “pure gold” and sent it to a document preservationist.

10. Rent It

So often we only need something for a season or a trip. And so often we forget we can actually rent things instead of buying something we are not likely to use again or our kids will outgrow. Consider these rentals:

• Home Depot rents equipment

• Berkeley Public Library has a Tool Lending Library

• REI rents outdoor gear

• Sports Basement rent snow and camping gear down to socks and boots

• Uhaul has recycled moving totes/bins instead of boxes

You’ll save money and resources when you rent items only needed for a one-time project or adventure. 

There’s a lot of good, rich information here.

And you don’t have to do it all at once! Take small steps and do what feels attainable right now.

Have a bag of clothes you were planning to drop off at the Goodwill? Quickly jump on Facebook and list it as a free porch pick-up on Marketplace, or join your local Buy Nothing group. Getting ready to finally take the family camping? Rent or borrow what gear you can instead of going out and buying all new stuff you might never use again. Get stuff fixed or post it letting someone know they can get it fixed.

Rehoming our stuff is accessible and possible. You may have to work a bit for it, but it is worth it, right?! And with that, we can take small steps to better our local communities, our society and our planet.

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

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• Find the Keepers. The first part of any move is deciding what is coming with you and what you can let go of. 

• Organize the Rest. Make a list of everything that needs to go, and break it down into things you’re hoping to sell and items you’re looking to recycle or give away.

• It Takes Time. Give yourself at least a month. In order to find the right buyer, organize your donations and research local specialty recycling centers (think eyeglasses, medical supplies, paint cans) you’ll want to start early. 

• It’s a Process. And it will evolve. We recommend labeling boxes with painter's tape, so you can change the labels as you go.

• Better Boxes. Reusable bins are a great, secure, and trash-free way to move. Reused boxes can also work well, and are easily sourced from a grocery/liquor store or friends. Instead of bubble wrap, use household linens, towels, and sweaters for cushion.

Just because you don’t know what to do with something, doesn’t mean it has to go in the trash. There are tons of resources, especially in the Bay Area, for properly disposing of all sorts of household items.

I put together a handy list of my go-to resources for selling, freecycling, recycling, and upcycling so you can find every item a new home:

SF BAY AREA & LOCAL 

• SF Smiles: We LOVE this organization for so many reasons. Right now, they are looking for specific items so please be sure to read this through before contacting for donation. Chad, the founder, lists his hours for donation, which changes weekly and links to a google doc on his website. If you'd like to learn more about him and the organization, check out this interview we did with him in September.

• Buy Nothing. This is one of our favorite resources to get in the practice of a gift economy! Using the free platform provided by Facebook Groups, you can quickly get rid of things that are cluttering your space or save money by getting things for free... all while building community. Start by finding your local group.

• Post for a "no contact pickup" on Nextdoor, Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, LetGo and other online platforms.

• Check out this comprehensive list of Goodwill locations in San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin counties that are reopening along with their hours of operation!

NATIONAL

• If you have a box and a printer, you can get a prepaid shipping label and send your things off to Give Back Box. Click here to get a label. Bonus: shipping is free!

• Schoola is an amazing organization for donations. Fill a box with gently worn clothes, print a label and leave the box for the mail carrier. It’s that easy! They sort and sell your items for you and give 40% of the sales proceeds to your school or a partner cause.

If you’re stumped on where something should go, reply to me directly or in the comments. I love to find the needle in a haystack of who is looking for the thing that you have. Donating doesn’t have to be daunting. I’ve formed dozens of partnerships so don’t hesitate to reach out for more support and resources!

Thank you for being a part of Next Highest Good, where we explore ways to resist overconsumption and create change through zero waste living. By tapping the heart icon or hitting the restack button you help this movement grow and it makes me do a happy dance.

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