hmm welcome to a scrap life a podcast solely focus on the hustlers grinders operators and business owners who live and breathe the scrap metal industry every day we are the original recyclers no suits required just guts and hard work here is your host brett eckhart all right i’m get i got another podcast coming your way i got i found a guy to return on the podcast when my muscle did not did a too bad a job the first time we uh sat down and talked um but i got jim keith here from uh recycling today man i’m kind of stoked i’m stoked for a lot of reasons a because i like jim um but b because uh he’s kind of letting me get involved in kind of a pet project of his that he’s been kind of working on behind the scenes and i’m excited for it i mean i think it hits you know my demographic well of the grassroots people of our industry so jim uh no introduction needed but how’s it going man introduce yourself give us a little bit of a quick background on you again let everybody know

exactly what you do on the day-to-day absolutely hey brett it’s great to be back with you thanks uh thanks again for uh for inviting me and and excited to be here again with you um so on publisher recycling today magazine as you can see and behind me we also published construction and demolition recycling magazine and waste today magazine so we’re kind of in all the sectors around waste and recycling um and um i’ve been i’ve had a lot of good success here fortune to be with recycling today for over 30 years so i’ve been in this recycling industry for a long time started very much involved in the scrap side of our business and and spent a lot of time there today and uh and really happy to do it so i think you have more connections i think you’ve got more connections than most people just by the nature of the beast of what you do um in this industry i i’d wager your connections against a lot of people well i don’t know about that but i i definitely have had the good fortune over the years to meet a

lot of people in the industry not only across the united states but around the world who are involved in in recycling business and uh listen i think that’s one of the greatest things about the industry is the people it’s getting to know the people it’s meeting people it’s you know interacting with different people um learning about their businesses learning about how they scrapped out a living and created a business it’s uh to me this this industry is full of great people and amazing stories of companies who have been built really just by hard work and ingenuity and perseverance but the other cool element of it is you find so often and i think this is true just like for a company like yours they’re able to create a business that provides for an awful lot of people and that is a cool element to the industry that a lot of people don’t even know what scrap is or scrap recycling is you know but but there’s so many people who make their living in this industry it’s amazing yeah 100 so let’s cut to the chase i you approached me a while back and

said hey brad i’ve kind of got this idea that i’ve been cooking on for a while and i think it can be kind of a game changer um you you kind of explained it to me and i was like yeah man i like it i like it and then i ran into you at izuri and you were like you were like really you were you had made some progress some significant progress on it and you hit me up and i was like dude i’m in i’m i’m i’m in and i don’t want to i want you to tell i i don’t want to be the one that kind of um explains that you don’t want to let your head out of the body i want it to be you man it’s all you i’m really just here to facilitate and help you get the word out because this isn’t a paid promotion you’re not giving me a dime to have to do this but i’m excited about it i’m excited for you and i think it can really be a game changer so explain everybody what uh what you got cooking so the concept

i actually reached out to you is about is a new event that we’re producing here at recycling today and it’s going to be called scrap expo and scrap expo is not like anything any other kind of event that exists in the industry the genesis of this idea really started i would argue it probably at least a decade ago maybe longer when i had over the years a lot of customers a lot of our advertising customers came to us and said jimmy could you help us figure out how we could organize uh like a road show so we could take a machine around and show a bunch of people in different places how it works what it does the benefit of it and we can never really figure out a good way to make those logistics work you know the cost’s hard and people don’t necessarily scrap dealers i understand that they don’t necessarily want competitors coming into their yard to not only to see their operations but also to see a new piece of equipment and so we could never really figure out a good way to make that work so it was just

kind of one of those things in the back of my mind well we’re part of a larger media company called gie media and as gie were involved in oh 20 different industry sectors and we’ve seen live demonstration events happen in different industries we participate in a big one in the landscape industry for example and these events allow operators to come out and run equipment actually jump up and compare brand x to brand z to brand y and figure out what what works for me what’s the difference between these things and so i started thinking there’s a real need for this in the industry you know recycling today which is over 16 000 businesses in this uh recycling industry were about 7 000 scrap dealers in that in that market reach most of those people don’t belong to any trade associate they don’t go to any meetings they don’t go to any kind of convention and so to us it looked like a wonderful opportunity to create a venue where people could come network learn about machinery and learn about how to maintain their machinery because one of the things that we hear so often

again from our advertising customers is folks get a piece of equipment in and they don’t maintain it right or they don’t know how to maintain it right and so all of a sudden they start having performance issues doesn’t work it’s not producing no bails no cut scrap and boom they have trouble interestingly for for me and i know you’ve seen this brett over your years is you know when i started in the industry 30 years ago there was not a there was equipment but not a huge not been a volume of equipment that was purpose-built for scrap as there is today it’s it’s dramatic to change and the other thing that’s happened is all the equipment’s become more sophisticated right a lot more sophisticated and so maintaining it so that you can maintain your your production and your operations really important so scrap expo is an event that’s really dedicated to the idea of live demonstration we’re gonna have 10 acres of outdoor space where operators are going to be able to jump up and run a machine if you want to see an al john log and see how it works you’re

going to be able to do it if you want to run a senebogen material handler you’re going to be able to do it along with a lot of other equipment that’s going to be there on site we’re also going to have a indoor exhibit area you’ll be able to check out software check out um we’ve got some people from commodity market pricing services we’ve got some people who sell you know used equipment who are going to be participating in that people who sell new equipment we’ve got all kinds of vendors industry scrap industry vendors who have committed to participating in scrap expo so we’re really excited about this element and remember the question i asked you not to cut you off but remember that question i just asked you probably two weeks ago and we were talking about this we’re kind of outlining like uh potential podcasts and like how do we get this going i said so so jim do you guys what do you guys know about uh trade shows and what do you guys know about putting on have you guys ever done it and you’re like oh brett like we

put on and you kind of went into it and i was like oh you guys do know your fair share about how works right and you know what’s going to make it valuable to somebody to actually go check it out we we’ve been doing it a long time uh as a company we probably produce depends upon the year last couple of years have been a little different of course yeah but we typically produce 25 to 35 events a year in the recycling industry we launched our um what has become our paper and plastics recycling conference uh in the year 2000. um that was the first year that we held that event in uh in that year we held it in atlanta georgia and we’ve held it around the country but primarily in chicago and atlanta and for the last decade we’ve been in chicago every year yeah and and that’s a super well attended event in that sector paper and plastics recycling and again as a company we’ve got a whole division of our business committed to event production so we know how to do this now is scrap expo different than what we’ve

done in the past it sure is but i also remember the first time i went to india to host a conference and the first time i went to china to host a conference i remember walking in one day and talking to my conference manager and saying do you think we could host an event in dubai how do you feel about that and she said um i have no idea how that will work but we can figure it out and we did and we hosted several very successful events there so we’ve learned over the years how to do this stuff by trial and error in some cases but also um also because we have an idea what we’re looking for and how to make it work but also be honest with you we’re going to have a live operating facility in what we do at scrap expo i am not a scrap dealer i’m a publisher right i’m not a safety guy i’m a publisher so what i’ve done is gone out and found some folks in the scrap industry i went out and uh actually talked to an old friend of mine who recently

retired from the industry uh some some of you folks probably know him jim or mack macaluso and mac’s been working with me to help figure out some of the layouts some of the how do we how do we make sure it’s safe we’ve had to develop a whole site safety plan we’re going to have safety marshals on site to make sure that the event is is safe for everybody and that people get a chance to get up and run the equipment right that’s what it’s all about well that’s the differentiator right like i think you know and you know going back to what you just piece of what you said before you haven’t never you’ve never put on a scrap expo it’s the first one but what is cool about in my mind is being a just being a true scrap guy is you know it’s fun to go look at the equipment and it’s all shined up and sitting there and you can walk around and check it out that’s great but there’s just something about being able to sit in the seat being able to watch something run like really run being

able to listen to it and look at the functionality and operate it that has a special place for the the true like grassroots of our industry right is i mean sometimes you go to these events and they’re pretty corporate and it’s a lot of buyers and sellers and they’re like very you know like hey um you know it’s very transactional versus say an event like this what kind of got me intrigued was a was different and i like that’s different and b it felt it was it felt more of like a reach down into the roots of our industry and that’s why we’re sitting here today i mean like i said i’m not getting anything out of this other than helping somebody that i feel like cares about the industry and wants like to put on something different than the same old stuff you’re going to see once a year so this event is really designed for the small medium-sized scrap dealer who who again doesn’t go to any kind of event but but primarily is interested in their operations right they buy and sell scrap and want to keep their costs down

in the yard understand what their costs are in fact we’re going to have a couple of sessions um that are going to be just about understanding your costs what it calls what does it cost you to process a ton of scrap right yeah um and we also picked a place like louisville kentucky we’re going to do the event september 13 and 14 in louisville kentucky louisville well we went to louisville because people can drive there most of the country i know you’re in boise so it’s a little bit far for you to drive but the distance but most of the country can drive to louisville within six to eight hours right something like 70 of the u.s population can drive to louisville in six to eight hours and so it’s very accessible for the small to medium-sized dealer it’s also in a city that’s a great city louisville is a wonderful destination but it’s not a top top-tier city so that means it’s more a little bit more affordable for smaller companies right they could send more people we’re keeping the price point to to for uh registration quite reasonable so

that people can can afford to bring their yard manager bring their operations manager bring your crane operator bring your baler operator so that they can not only look at new equipment but also attend some of the technical sessions on how do i maintain my baler how do i maintain my my shear how do i maintain my material handler that kind of thing so we’re trying to remain really focused on that small to medium size listen we’re going to have some of the big companies there i know that i’ve been approached by numerous of them who intend to send um a bunch of their operations people that’s fantastic but it’s really designed for these small to medium sized plus the auto dismantler i mean you know with recycling today we reach about 1600 auto dismantlers across the country and a lot of those dismantlers have involvement in the scrap business they run some scrap equipment they’re also in the used parts business but they also will benefit from an event like this you know we’re going to have one of our out of curiosity on that front are you going to have like a wet

car are you going to have a good drain racks um for like the auto dismanters and the reason i ask this is because i have both right i have auto salvaged and scrap and but all of our yards buy wet cars i mean this is part of the process so technically we are somewhat in the auto business even on the yards that aren’t selling parts is that going to be an option for your auto dismantlers are they going to have a watch the process of a wet car get drained or anything like that they are they are we’ve got a couple of uh exhibitors committed who are gonna have the the deep pollution systems the the um we’ve got one who’s got a whole demo plan he’s gonna show how you how you you know drain all the fluids how you harvest a cat um how you harvest wire harnesses how you drop a motor and and crack the motor block i mean the whole thing it’s going to be like a live working area where people are going to be able to see how all this machinery works what’s available to them and

frankly in some cases again a lot of this machinery is pretty advanced makes it pretty easy to do a lot of these things that used to take lots of man hours and lots of people still do it that way so you can see if you want to harvest cats when your cars come in this is a great way you can do it so yeah we’re excited about it one of the so last year through our converter business we did we put together a booth uh and display at the sema show which is in vegas um specialty after markets i mean and it’s a it’s the second biggest show in vegas every year next to the uh electronics one the ces okay um and i and i was mine i was it was mind-boggling how big it was but the coolest thing i liked about it is when you went in there they had paint booths they had guys grinding they had plas tables cutting parts they had all the stuff but it wasn’t just you know a picture of it or a display model it was like because they do it at the

convention center and it’s all these it’s all these uh guys selling parts aftermarkets like wheel polishers you know will basically if you damage your wheel there’s a machine that will scrape the outside layer off and basically turn and ding there into a new looking wheel and they were running everything right which you just don’t get to see that very often if you go to some of your great shows and so it would to me i was like oh you can really do this at a trade show and they’re and they’re like well yeah i mean if it’s if it’s set up right it’s big enough so that was kind of like my flashback moment when you were when you told me about this i was like oh this is going to be like the scrap sema it’s like you’re going to have real equipment we’re going to literally have like a sheer row where you’re going to be able to jump up and and run a ronald a bounty run to genesis run a sheer core all like right next to one another and check them out yeah you know each one of them

are your great machines but they do they have you know their own benefits and and so listen as an operator you have a chance to do that how else could you do that particularly particularly if you’re an owner operator right so you’re in your yard every day running operations how do you you can’t run around the country looking at different equipment very easily right here you may become one spot check it all out no and that was that was that was the thing you know obviously the grassroots part is what got me probably the most excited just because that’s kind of where i that’s kind of the world i live in you know i’m not not too corporate it’s not too big uh yeah i gotta i got a good i get a good feeling when i’m around guys that are similar in in size and as far as um number of yards and smaller and just how they run and how their fingers are and you know all all facets of the business and i feel like this event is kind of born and bred for that type of person it absolutely is

i mean that’s the thing is we tried to create an event here that would help that small dealer become bet better faster stronger remember the six million dollar man yeah faster stronger so that’s the idea is you know get access to information um check out the equipment i met with some friends of mine who were auto dismantlers who talked about there used to be an event in that space that was a live demo event and some of those folks they said man i learned about equipment that made me so much money by going to that i would have never known it existed and i would have never bought it even if i’d have seen it because i wouldn’t have believed it worked but when i got to touch it feel it and use it i said that’s going to work in our yard and we we bought it so we’ve really tried to build the build the event organically like that now listen we’re going to have some good networking opportunities as well we’re gonna shut down at the end of day one the live exhibits lock down tag out everything and let people

share some drinks together for a little while um so we’ll have a good opening night reception we’re gonna have um we’re even going to have a couple commodity sessions so people can hear a little bit about what’s going on in the commodity markets but you know again our focus is very much on machinery and operations nice nice so give me some dates what is what what are the dates of the the show so we’re going to be september 13 and 14 of 2022 in louisville kentucky we’re going to go on the first date start at 10 a.m and go to 5. next day we’ll run from 9 a.m until 4. and so again folks who drive in can get home probably back in their yard on thursday morning if you’re flying in we’re right next to the louisville airport literally we are across the street from the louisville airport at the facility we’re going to be in you can walk from the hotel to the expo center and the indoor and outdoor exhibits are right next to each other so you can just go go between them simple nice nice and then

for those of you that have never been to louisville i mean i’ve been there i’ve been there i think two times now um it is a cool city i do like the fact that it’s you know i like that you put it in louisville not because it’s it’s definitely not easy for me to get to um but i like the fact that more more chaotic well that’s life um but i like the fact that it caters to a little bit more affordability and which goes back to like you know the grassroots piece of it is you know you if you if you’ve got if you got to fly in there and drive in there but you’re not just getting gouged out the neck for the for the hotel or whatever and you can go find an affordable place to eat dinner or lunch or whatever then there’s something to be said for that because you know some of these places you go whether it’s in california or you go to vegas or whatever and you want to go have a meal you better pack it you know you better pack your checkbook that’s right

that’s right louisville’s we chose louisville because of its location and because it’s it’s an affordable city but it’s a cool city you know it’s a cool city yeah it’s the home of the louisville slugger right the louisville slugger baseball bat it’s it’s uh it’s got the urban bourbon trail right downtown um you can go on on a on a bourbon trail tour in in kentucky real easily from louisville it’s a great city it’s uh it’s got a lot to offer and it’s a it’s a neat place to visit why why why september what’s the why why why did you choose those dates was there you know we we really wanted to be away from in the spring there’s a lot of big events in the industry um and so we wanted to stay away from those spring events and and give it a break for people but we also know we listen again we’re tailored to the small to medium sized yards out there we don’t want to be in the middle of the summer when people are trying to maybe sneak in a family vacation kids are off school so we want to

do when the kids are back to school and when um we’re not really competing with lots of other large national events that’s what that was our focus that makes sense that makes sense well i’m stoked man i’m excited i’m excited for it i’m excited to get out there and uh i’m gonna come out um bring a couple of our guys and we’re gonna we’re gonna do some some fun marketing stuff we’re gonna do some i’m i’m an equipment junkie i’m a well uh you are an equipment junkie i do have i do have an equipment purchasing problem sometimes as like people like to say um but i just i understand the value of what you know equipment can do for your business i understand that component of it thanks to my dad and uh so i’ll be out there just to check out the equipment and to to meet and talk to people and we’re gonna do some podcasting out there so we’re stoked yeah um we’re looking forward to we’re going to have you up on up on our center stage doing up doing a podcast and and also we’re going to have

a podcast booth set up so you can do some other podcasts uh while you’re there over the over the couple of days yeah it’s gonna be a good time man reception has been been incredible we we have had so many inquiries it’s it’s really unbelievable people are very excited and one of the things that did catch me by surprise was the interest of some of the largest companies in the industry which i didn’t fully expect that’s not what we built the event around um but but there’s been a lot of interest from those folks and and that’s been neat um but overall the reception from the industry has been truly tremendous we’ve been we i’ve been humbled by by the amount of interest that we’ve had in scrap expo we’re really looking forward to meeting getting everyone together in september in louisville networking wins man all networking wins your ability to talk to other operators your ability to talk to other people you know i just posted a video on uh linkedin yesterday of our non-ferrous area we had installed a new sierra baylor and um one of the ideas on how to

kind of wrap the um the pit for the conveyor i i stole from olga and a few guys i was down their yard looking at and i was like hey how do you guys got that set up i got a bailer coming in a couple months and i wanted to kind of see it set up and just because i had made a networking connection with them and i was able to come look at their yard see how they set something up it enabled me to design my pit and you know my railing and everything as just a copycat right like i didn’t need to reinvent the wheel but that’s why i feel like networking these events um some other projects we got coming are huge is you know i i think steel sharpened steel and that’s i think that’s that’s the biggest thing with with an event like this is if you get three shares two shares working side by side those companies will probably make each other better too they’ll either they’ll sharpen their sales pitch they’ll sharpen how they do stuff and the guys that are there checking it out and gals

that are looking at this equipment like it they’re gonna have the ability to network and i mean that’s that’s what makes our industry stronger and i think that’s how we all win in the long run so i’m stoked it’s it’s uh absolutely true you know networking is such an important part of the industry there’s no you don’t go to college to learn scrap and you know you got to learn scrap by learning scrap and so you know scrap expo is is i say it’s an event that’s a it’s a pro scrap event it’s it’s really designed specifically for the scrap dealer right and we’re looking forward to it all right man so if you want to go if they want to they want to do some more research into it where do they go check out the website scrapeexpo.net okay scrapeexpo.net can they register right there right on the web you can register right on the website you can get information about the whole programs on the website information on the hotels that we’ve got set up the room blocks we’ve got available is all right there on the website so i

just encourage everyone to visit scrapexpo.net and they can capture all the information they need love all right jim i appreciate it man it’s great to be with you again man yeah absolutely man i i support the people that support doing what i do every day so this is an easy one for me thanks a million man yeah take care yeah take care we got it huh we’re good to go let me make sure before you uh um here we go i always lose that button