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Detroit Jewish News: Greening trend helps expand venerable family-owned salvage company
In 1927, the Rosen Salvage and Waste Paper Co. in Detroit used 13 pushcarts to collect scrap metal, paper and other waste. It then sold the materials to companies so they could manufacture new products.That's how Henry Rosen, a Jewish immigrant from the Ukraine, made a living. More than 80 years later, his descendants, using the modern name of GLR Recycling Solutions, based on Groesbeck Highway in Roseville, have turned the company into a $65 million a year business in a $3 billion yearly industry. The firm has six buildings on 14 acres, employs 220 people and now uses 16 trucks to convey almost 200,000 tons of materials a year to 30 smelter
plants around the world to be recycled for use in new products.
Better yet, about 350 green-conscious companies and individuals bring waste to the
Roseville site.
Although recycling can actually be traced back to the days of Greek philosopher Plato in 350 B.C.E. - archeologists say a lack of certain materials at that time showed some things must have been reused - the green movement really didn't pick up momentum in the United States until 10-15 years ago. GLR Recycling Solutions has been at the forefront of that campaign, becoming the largest single-stream recycling operation in Michigan; single-streaming allows people to deliver mixed materials, which then are sorted by machine.
"We were in this business before greening and recycling became fashionable," observed Ben Rosen, 84, of West Bloomfield, who quit high school at 17 to enter his father's business in 1941. "I figured I'd get more of an education by learning this business than going to school, and I'm glad I did because this was a great business to get into."
He's now president and still comes to the office almost every day.
The other family members of the multigenerational business are Ben's son, Sandy Rosen, 44, of Bloomfield Hills, who is CEO and vice president; Ben's daughter, Ilene Bischer, 42, of Macomb Township, secretarytreasurer; and Dr. Steve Rosen of West
Bloomfield, who gave up his medical practice to head the plastic and foam operation. He still teaches radiology.
Shifting Sands
The company was basically a scrap metal business when Henry Rosen, who died in 1973, changed the name to H. Rosen & Sons and moved elsewhere in Detroit before Ben took over, called it Great Lakes Recycling, and brought it to Roseville in the late 1970s; it became GLR Recycling Solutions in 2006.
"My father hit it big when he bought his first truck, a Ford pickup, in the 1930s," Ben Rosen recalled. "He added more trucks and that enabled us to pick up materials from the Big Bear supermarket chain, Kresge, Woolworth and Neisner Brothers department stores and many other well-known Detroit businesses. We then sold the materials to the larger scrap yards."
GLR's most popular area is the Recycling Zone, a public drop-off center for residential and office recycling, which accepts most types of consumer and office recyclable materials, including paper, cardboard, plastics and metal. In some cases, GLR even will pay cash for large quantities of various materials.
"We let people turn some of that old stuff in the garage or basement into cash," said Jim DiMarco of Clarkston, head of marketing and new business development. In general, acceptable items include newspapers, magazines, catalogues, phone books, computers, laptops, copiers, fax machines, CD players, cell phones, circuit boards,
copper tubing, air conditioning compressors, radiators, fans, transmissions, auto scrap, lawn mowers, snow blowers, gutters and roof vents, sinks, pots and pans, carpet padding, all types of plastic materials and, probably most importantly, junk mail.
Customer Take
Walker Printery, Inc., of Oak Park is both a supplier and customer of GLR. The 84-year old firm prints thousands of business forms a year for GLR and also drops off waste paper, plastics and scrap metal.
"We've been doing business with them for 15 years and it's a great operation; the Rosens are a wonderful family," said Steve Traison of West Bloomfield, vice president of Walker. "It's a pleasure to work with such an honest company."
GLR's six buildings include the corporate office, two buildings for metals, and one each for electronics, paper, and foam and plastic. Huge pieces of equipment, like a Sweed chopper, which is a heavy-duty granulator that rips through plastic materials, and a wire chopper, grind cables and dry-separate copper or aluminum from plastic or rubber.
"The machines are soundproofed and equipped with a dust-collection system, keeping dust emissions from getting into the environment," Dr. Rosen pointed out.
"I know our grandfather, Henry, would have been proud of our expansion program that includes acquiring a recycling plant in North Tonawanda, N.Y., a new facility in Flint Township, and building a state-of-the art structure in Huron Township," said Bischer.
"The latter will allow us to double our capacity for single-stream recycling. It also will have a tour mezzanine for school groups and others to learn how important recycling is to the environment."
Other features of GLR Recycling's operation include stringent safety measures, with a full-time safety and security director; Dale Carnegie courses that enhance selfimprovement for employees; volunteer clean-up efforts by employees who helped delitter parts of Goesbeck Highway; and a quarterly employee newsletter, Recycling
Matters.
"GLR Recycling is the most honorable company we do business with," said David Kaufman, president of United Plastics of Flint, which has been in business for 32 years and has been working with GLR for 15 years. United, a plastics processor, picks up close to 3 million pounds of scrap plastics a year from GLR for recycling and sale as
plastic raw materials to companies around the world.
What’s In Your Trash Can?
Recycling conserves natural resources, helps prevent overcrowding of landfills and protects the environment, say
members of the Rosen family who operate GLR Recycling Solutions.
They say residents should look inside their trash cans to see how much of the contents should actually be recycled, and they should keep a recycle bin in their homes - where they can see it so they won't forget to use it.
Recycling efforts in the United States have grown seven percent in the past five years.
Contents of a typical trash can are: 35 percent organic; 30 percent paper; 12 percent construction materials; 9 percent plastics; 6 percent metal; 3 percent glass and 5 percent miscellaneous materials.
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