Annual numbers, 2024 edition

Every January we publish a recap of the prior year's operating numbers. The full version is in the Sustainability Report; here are the headlines.

Totes diverted from landfill: 21,604. Up from 14,820 in 2023. The growth came almost entirely from new buy-back partnerships in Indianapolis and Pittsburgh, plus a bigger soap co-op in central Ohio.

Virgin HDPE displaced: 412,636 kg. Same arithmetic as totes diverted, multiplied by 19.1 kg per bottle.

CO₂e avoided: 829,594 kg cradle-to-gate. Equivalent to taking ~180 passenger vehicles off the road for a year.

Wash water reclaimed: 92.1%. Up from 89.4% in 2023. The improvement came from a single upgrade — adding a third-stage carbon filter to our reclaim loop.

Pelletized in-house: 58,907 kg. End-of-life HDPE that became regrind for North American molders. This number tracks tightly to our scrap rate (still ~6% of incoming bottles).

Regrind exported overseas: 0 kg. The same number every year. Not changing.

Truck miles per tote sold: 3.07. Down from 3.81 in 2023. Backhauling is the big lever here — we ran at 84% backhaul rate this year vs 71% the prior year. Every empty return leg eliminated is meaningful.

Total revenue: undisclosed. We don't publish this; we're privately held and small enough that the number isn't public-interest.

Net new headcount: 2. A driver and a wash-bay technician. Total team is 11 now. Healthcare and profit-share for everyone.

One miss: the diesel pilot. We were planning to put a Class-6 EV box truck into service this year as a pilot. The lead time on the truck slipped to early 2026, and the local charging infrastructure isn't yet fast enough to support our typical 350-mi day. Still committed; pushed to later.

One win: cage paint upgrade. Switched the wash-bay paint from a basic enamel to a zinc-rich primer + topcoat. Adds ~$2/cage, extends cage service life by 4+ years. Math is overwhelming.

Onward.