Fresh Perspective

Emily Molstad, co-founder and CEO of Valis, shares her journey to the scrap industry and her take on market volatility, the benefits of sensor-based sorting and how the industry can engage more young people.

Josephita Harry, vice president of nonferrous metals and electronic scrap sales at Miami-based Pan American Zinc, explains how she made her way into the scrap recycling industry about a decade ago.

George Strom, vice president of municipal services at Morton Grove, Illinois-based LRS, shares his story of joining his family’s business and eventually becoming a part of the LRS team in the last year. He talks about LRS’ acquisition strategy as well as some trends he is noticing with municipal recycling.

Neil Chalupa, a trader at Metal Conversions, began his career working in logistics. He shares how those experiences helped him in his role at Metal Conversions as well as some potential solutions to consider with trucking-related challenges.

Adam Jackson, director of metals trading at Aegis Hedging Solutions LLC, shares his story of how he got into providing hedging solutions for the scrap industry as well as what it was like when he owned a scrap hedging business.

After spending the start of his career in various broadcasting jobs, Robert Burns landed a director of marketing position at Sunnking in Brockport, New York. Burns shares how he has been helping to boost social media traffic and marketing efforts for the electronics recycler in the past two years, offering tips other recyclers can follow.

Rob Wise, account executive at Ferrous Processing & Trading Co., shares how several different career paths eventually led him to the scrap industry eight years ago. He also offers his thoughts on some of the industry’s biggest challenges and opportunities today.

Caroline Allman, compliance officer at Apto Solutions, shares how she found out about the recycling and ITAD industry as well as ways she has gotten involved to help with industry associations.

Megan O’Connor, founder and CEO of Nth Cycle, shares how she got the idea to start her business, which is focused on recycling lithium-ion batteries, and some of the company’s goals for the future.

Josh Gensic, director of purchasing at Audubon Metals, shares how he went from working in a furniture store to the scrap industry. He offers some lessons he has learned since joining the industry as well as new technologies he hopes to see the industry embrace.