Eden Alley goes above its duty - Kansas City Business Journal:

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Eden Alley Cafe does. The restauranty is located on the lower level ofthe , which handlesw garbage pickup for the building. But Eden Alley, a vegetariamn restaurant, pays $230 a month to have Recyclinfg dispose of everythingfrom food-preparation leftovers to the stuff customersa leave on their plates. The garbagew is placed in a black, 95-gallon bin in back of the and Missouri Organic picks it up three timeaa week. Missouri Organic, which is locatedf near the at7700 E. U.S. Highway 40, adds the would-bde trash to yard waste.
The result is a soil enrichef the company calls Nature Wise EdenAlley co-owner Greg Clootz said the additional bill is worth it because of the societalp expense of throwing thing s away. The cafe has been contractinvg with Missouri Organic for abouftthree months, diverting about 90 percent of the cafe’ds food waste from the landfill. In busineszs since 1992, Missouri Organic’s Food Residuals Environmentap Diversion program processesbetween 12,000 and 15,000 tons of food waste a Vice President Kevin Anderson said. Contributors include large industrial clients such as the facilityin St. Joseph and ’s soybean-crushinfg plant southeast of Interstate 35 andFrony Street.
Eden Alley’s output of roughlu 400 pounds a week is peanutz compared withthose giants, but Anderson said it just goes to “Everybody has their part to play. Nothin is too small, I guess is the thing.” Eden Alley has been in business for nearlhy15 years, and the Missouri Organixc contract is just one of its greej initiatives. For instance, it buys environmentally friendlyh to-go containers and cutlery fromKansas City-based and Eco-Productx in Boulder, Colo. Compostable cutlery costse about 6 centsan item, Clootz said.
Regular plastic utensils cost abouta half-cent Eden Alley gradually has expandec its green initiatives because of thei expense, but Clootz said it’s worth every penny. “It’s one ecosystemm — our body and the Earth,” he “What you put out theree is whatyou get. So at some point, it’sa got to change somewhere.”