By Dave Schwab

Waste business has evolved over the years

When the Snyder family acquired the company now known as EDCO Disposal back in the ’60s, they never imagined half a century later the business would be more about recycling than trash collecting.

“I like to say that landfills are going out of business,” said John Snyder, vice president of EDCO Waste & Recycling, which is celebrating its golden anniversary this year.

EDCO has been picking up La Mesa’s trash for 50 years, ever since Snyder’s grandfather from Orange County purchased La Mesa Disposal in 1967.

“From 1967 to 1990, we were just a garbage hauler,” said Snyder. “From 1990 to today we’ve evolved, getting more into recycling than trash collecting.”

Snyder noted EDCO was one of the first companies to participate in residential and commercial curbside recycling, as well as handling construction recycling.

“More than half of the business is involved in the recycling end (now),” he pointed out.

Looking ahead, Snyder sees more change coming.

“The future will be involved with how we manage the waste stream,” he predicted. “The next material we’ll be handling (more of) is organics — green, wood and food waste. That’s the next opportunity. We’re getting into it.”

EDCO Disposal Corporation provides solid waste disposal and recycling services in the city of La Mesa under an exclusive franchise agreement. Services provided include collection, transfer and disposal of all solid waste, recyclables and yard waste generated at all residential and commercial properties in the city.

On its website, edcodisposal.com, EDCO claims to have “a trash solution for everyone regardless of whether that involves curbside pickup, a dumpster, a roll off box or a storage container. EDCO operates clean, well-maintained equipment offering innovative waste collection and recycling services to meet the needs of each customer.”

During the past 50 years, the Snyder family business has grown from 10 employees to about 300, many of whom work in recycling, which didn’t even exist when the company first started out.

Growing — and changing — with the times over the past half century has been a transformative experience for the trash hauler, noted Snyder.

“Back then, there were no big publicly traded companies in the industry, just small owner-operators,” he said, adding the biggest change over the last 50 years came in 1989 when the California legislature passed AB 939.

“That bill mandated California’s cities and counties to recycle 50 percent of their solid waste by 2020,” Snyder said adding EDCO responded by “opening our first recycling materials recovery facility in Lemon Grove.”

Like many other industries today, trash hauling has undergone technological innovation.

“Along with curbside recycling, we went to automatic collection in the ’90s, where an automatic arm on the truck picks up the trash, which is much more efficient and takes less time allowing you to pick up many more (receptacles) than before by doing it manually,” Snyder said. “That’s become the industry standard.”

EDCO also has a well-deserved reputation for being involved in, and giving back to, the communities it serves.

“We’ve been involved in charities,” said Snyder, adding that organizations such as La Mesa National Little League, La Mesa Parks and Rec, and the Grossmont Hospital Foundation have all benefited from the company’s largess.

Snyder noted EDCO has made a major investment in environmental sustainability, “converting our diesel trucks to compressed natural gas, a far cleaner and better alternative power than diesel that we started using in 2009. Now more than half of our fleet is compressed natural gas.”

Snyder said EDCO’s future looks promising, in part due to more recycling mandates passed this year by the California Legislature and Gov. Jerry Brown, which has set an ambitious goal of 75 percent for recycling, composting or source reduction of solid waste by 2020.

“Our goal is to divert as much waste as possible from landfills, which we don’t own and don’t intend to,” Snyder said. “The state has also set new goals for a few years ahead for cities and counties. That’s going to help keep us in business. We’re going to have to plan for it.”

—Freelance reporter Dave Schwab can be reached at [email protected].