This week we publish our annual recyclers and brokers ranking issue. In the chart we rank the top 26 reprocessors, as well as a directory for all 195 firms.
This listing represents 13.4 billion pounds of material moved in 2017, fairly steady with the last few years. A total of 76 percent was reprocessed while 24 percent was brokered material.
Let's talk about those material brokers. From our data gathering, we see the number of firms selling recycled plastic is declining. In fact, we have 7 percent fewer firms verified as still in business. As expected then, the average number of pounds per firm is going up: About 5 percent more that what we reported in 2015.
Now let's check in on the reprocessed material, which was up 3.4 percent overall. What's more interesting is that for the top 10 top firms gaining volumes, an impressive 446 million more pounds were reprocessed over last year's reported figures.
What does that all mean? Based on some of the comments from our survey forms, its seems recyclers are choosing to reprocess more material than they ship off.
We welcomed three new firms to the top 25:
Antek Madison Plastics Recycling Corp. of Scarborough, Ontario.
Merlin Plastics Alberta Inc. of Delta, Alberta.
National Container Group LLC of Chicago.
And a welcome to the directory for these firms:
A1 Polymer Recycling LLC of Macon, Ga.
Earth First Aid Curbside Recycling Inc. of Billings, Mont.
SPS Plastics LLC of Columbia, Md.
The ranking data can be found online at www.plasticsnews.com/rankings/recyclers.
We also offer the full rankings data for sale in the Plastics News Store at www.plasticsnews.com/data.
If you don't see your firm on this list, we would like to include you next time. Just sent a note to Hollee Keller at [email protected] or complete our survey form, you can find it online.
