Photograph courtesy Cincinnati Recycle and Reuse Hub
Thirty-six thousand square feet can hardly contain the expanding operations of Cincinnati Recycle and Reuse Hub, a waste diversion non-profit located in Price Hill. Nicknamed “the Hub”, this organization works to divert materials and waste previously destined for the trash heaps at Rumpke. What began during the COVID-19 pandemic with a front porch drop-off service has expanded into a large non-profit mission on track to divert 700,000 pounds of waste in 2025.
Cincinnati Recycle and Reuse Hub works to fill the gaps in standard recycling programs. The organization believes efforts to reduce waste are essential for building healthy communities and mitigating climate change. This year, the Hub has seen a 66% increase in materials to divert, more than doubling their intake from the year before. Operating mainly on volunteer efforts and donations, the Hub is facing one monumental and meaningful task—keeping going.
Three days a week, the Hub opens to the public, allowing the community to drop off a variety of items commonly thrown away. Plastics, foams, prescription bottles, aluminum, and even more obscure items, such as denim, shoes, eyewear, and old X-rays. All is recycled through the Hub, and all diverted waste finds a place and purpose through their programs and partnerships.
Chad Planner, the development director at the Hub, stressed the importance placed on vetting downstream partners before working with them in waste diversion, ensuring the most ethical and eco-friendly results for diverted materials.
A large amount of electronics are brought to the Hub as “junk”, believed to be broken or unstable. Items like vacuums, speakers, freezers, old computer equipment, lamps, and even smoke detectors. The priority is to evaluate if the e-waste can be repaired, a project taken on by the Tinker Team, a group of volunteers up for the task of servicing the unwanted electronics. The tinker team has a 55% success rate in repairing the “junk” brought in. Once restored, the items are donated to New Life Furniture Bank and provided to families in need.
Through the Cincinnati Recycle and Reuse Hub’s website, there is a thorough guide to the ins and outs of dropping off materials at the Hub. It is crucial to pre-sort items according to their guidelines and ensure they are clean and dry. A QR code check-in displayed inside the Hub helps collect data used to apply for support and grants to continue operation as it continuously expands.
The Hub collects, processes, and recirculates all the materials it intakes. Processing materials comes in many forms—typically, it requires items to be hand-sorted by volunteers according to the partnering organization taking the diverted waste. Many materials, such as plastics and styrofoam, must be stored until a minimum weight requirement is met and the partnering organization comes to collect them for the next step. This process is responsible for the Hub’s growing need for more square footage.
The Hub partners with organizations like Battery Recyclers of America, RecycleForce, Terracycle, and GoZero, among many others, affording complete transparency on where all materials go for reuse or recycling.
On the fourth floor of the Hub’s space, you’ll find The Hub Store. Donated materials in good condition that can’t be recycled through other programs are available for sale here. Flower pots, egg cartons, fabric scraps, school supplies, and other knick-knacks are all part of the store’s inventory. Most of the retail items are sold for one dollar per pound and are available to the public during any of the Hub’s open days.
In 2024, the Hub hit a milestone of one million pounds of waste diverted. Since being founded in 2021, 400,000 pounds of plastic and more than 500,000 pounds of e-waste have been diverted.
A majority of the volunteers at the Hub are retirees who find purpose and joy in being at the Hub once or twice a week. “People are just working their tails off. Like, the people here are just such a badass group of people. They’re awesome,” says Planning. Anyone can volunteer with Cincinnati Recycling and Reuse Hub; the opportunities are beginner-friendly and can be signed up for on their website.
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