UTICA — Family-owned Empire Recycling Corp. has fully reopened all of its metal-recycling facilities, including its location at 64 North Genesee St. in Utica, and resumed buying metal from the general public. Besides the Utica site, the firm also has metal-recycling operations in Syracuse, Waterloo, and Albany, Beth Park, director of public relations & marketing […]
UTICA — Family-owned Empire Recycling Corp. has fully reopened all of its metal-recycling facilities, including its location at 64 North Genesee St. in Utica, and resumed buying metal from the general public.
Besides the Utica site, the firm also has metal-recycling operations in Syracuse, Waterloo, and Albany, Beth Park, director of public relations & marketing at Empire Recycling, tells CNYBJ in an email.
Empire Recycling also has paper-recycling facilities in Utica, Clay, Binghamton, and Albany. Its facilities closed to the general public on March 24 in response to COVID-19 restrictions. However, with recycling services deemed essential, Empire remained open for commercial customers, contractors/tradesmen, and other essential businesses, according to Park.
“We were fortunate in that we did not need to furlough any employees. While business slowed down slightly with the closure to the general public, our metal and paper divisions needed to continue daily operations to keep up with the commercial customers and the processing of materials. As an essential business ourselves, we serve other essential businesses and keep them running,” Park said.
Empire Recycling had a “soft opening” of its metal-recycling facilities on May 4, meaning that it “slowly” began to accept metal from the general public again, according to Park.
“This soft opening allowed us to verify that our protective measures and new policies would adequately protect our team and customers,” she added.
The company is now requiring that all customers wear a mask to receive service, metal should be presorted prior to their arrival, and customers should remain in their car unless otherwise instructed.
Empire Recycling also has additional staff on-hand to help direct people and answer questions, which Park says has been “beneficial because we’re seeing a lot of new customers since we’ve reopened, many homeowners and people doing general clean-outs.”
The metal that Empire Recycling takes in and processes becomes raw materials used to make products “needed by our country’s frontline workers,” the company said.
Its commercial service, deemed essential, wasn’t interrupted during the COVID-19 restrictions.
“Our roll-off service still continued to haul away scrap metal from manufacturers and a variety of industries. And, our paper divisions continued to do on-site document destruction and accept cardboard recycling from essential businesses,” Park said.
About Empire Recycling
Empire Recycling, headquartered in Utica, has been family-owned for more than 100 years. It was founded in 1916 by Robert, Morton, and Louis Kowalsky.
Steven Kowalsky now serves as president of the company with his brother Ed serving as executive VP, per the firm’s website.
Multiple businesses now form the Empire Recycling Family of Companies, which employs a total of 200 people. The companies include Empire Recycling, ConfiData, SMR Fibre, Nathan Steel, ERC Transportation, and ERL Intermodal.
