Just Glass: Recycling Glass, Repurposing Lives

While working at a Kinko’s and trying to “find her place” in Nashville back in 2002, Tasha Lemley had an epiphany. On her way to work she had been walking past the same homeless man for months. One day, she went up to him, shook his hand and introduced herself. She then got to know him. This started her path to working with homeless Nashvillians and ultimately founding Nashville’s newspaper for the homeless, The Contributor. From The Contributor, she moved on to Justice Industries, a nonprofit organization that exists to build and sustain social enterprise businesses — creating job opportunities for individuals with barriers to traditional employment. One of their arms is Just.Glass, which offers curbside pickup of glass for recycling. The 11 employees are from a variety of backgrounds, including students, teachers, business-owners, entrepreneurs, ministers, caretakers, writers and parents and are all survivors of trauma such as homelessness, addiction, incarceration, mental illness and domestic violence. They work in teams of two, picking up the glass recycling bins from private residences and commercial businesses alike. Their residential service is a super reasonable $16 for a bin and 2 pick-ups per month. Today Just Glass has 500 residential customers and 16 commercial customers and is looking for more.