Mission & Story

Mission
To educate the public about environmental responsibility and stewardship, particularly in regards to solid waste management. Engage, Educate, Eliminate!

Our Story
The Clean Vibes Trading post was established in 2008 as the nonprofit arm of Clean Vibes – a company that has operated the recycling, compost, and cleanup programs at festivals across the country for the past 20 years. The Clean Vibes Trading Post makes it possible to increase recycling efforts and engage patrons in the process of respecting and protecting the environment.

In 2008, at Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, TN, the Clean Vibes Trading Post worked with event promoters, artists, and environmentally conscious companies to create a system of incentives to motivate fans to participate in recycling efforts. Fans could turn in pieces of recycling into the Clean Vibes Trading Post booth, collect points for each recycling piece, and later redeem their points for “prizes.” Prizes consisted of donations by the event producers, artists, and other eco-friendly companies. Examples include small prizes, such as sunscreen, to large prizes, such as free tickets to future events. Fans were excited about the opportunity to help keep Bonnaroo clean while earning cool prizes. The project was popular and effective!

In 2013, Clean Vibes Trading Post incorporated cigarette butt waste diversion into its programming with the help of Terracycle. Cigarette waste collected by patrons at events is shipped to Terracycle, where the company recycles and upcycles the materials into consumer products.

In its 12th year of operation (2019) the Clean Vibes Trading Post engaged countless attendees to participate. Patrons collected 156,250 pieces of recycling and 141,310 cigarette butts at five events in 2019. As of January 2020, participants have diverted over 3.2 million pieces of recycling and over 1.7 million cigarette butts from landfills across the United States!