Berea Printing Company is Near Zero Waste

Berea Printing Company in Berea, OH merges history, innovation and endurance. The Dettmer family has been in the printing business since 1967. Since its inception the company culture has been about efficiency and resourcefulness. The first thing that impresses me is the location of only two trash cans in the whole building - one in the office and one in the shop. The rest of the "waste" containers are for recyclable paper, plastic, glass, metal, shrink wrap. Almost all shipping & packaging materials are reused or recycled. Most materials being reused and recycled, so very little ends up in the waste can.

The plate making equipment is impressive as well. It reuses plain old tap water to clean the plates after they are made. There is no chemical byproduct after this process.

In the ink department there are a couple of shelves with small containers of mixed inks that could be reused in future printing jobs; they don't waste an ounce.

Near the printing press my eye catches a stack of beautifully died cloths. All are a combination of different color inks. It turns out the roll of cloth is used to clean the press after a run. After a couple of uses the roll is cut up in smaller pieces to be reused again for various clean ups around the press. Eventually, blackened cloths are collected and shipped to a company that uses them in the energy production process.

To prevent heat loss, they have installed a heat curtain on their loading dock. It resulted in happier employees and energy savings.

The Dettmer family values inspired a sustainable company culture that supports the triple bottom line thinking.