Rheaply, the resource exchange platform enabling circularity for every business through the management, reuse, and upcycling of physical assets, today announced its acquisition of The United States Business Council for Sustainable Development’s Materials Marketplace™ (US BCSD). Reply will leverage the Materials Marketplace’s network of 2,200 partners and expertise in the upcycling of building materials, significantly improving the company’s efforts to divert building waste from landfills, as well as generate significant cost savings, energy savings, and create new jobs and business opportunities.
Up to 40% of emissions come from the manufacturing, construction, and demolition of materials within our built environment, materials of which are the main products listed and have found reuse through The Materials Marketplace™. Rheaply’s integration of its technology platform will elevate the circular economy to transform how building and manufacturing waste is recovered and reused, where one organization’s hard-to-recycle waste and byproducts becomes another organization’s raw material for furnishings, new development projects, and product fabrication.
“It’s been exciting to see how much the marketplace has accomplished since the days when company reps were sitting around tables poring over spreadsheets of inputs and outputs. The software that’s automating those connections now needs the kind of expertise that a company like Rheaply can offer to take it to the next level,” said Andrew Mangan Founder and Former Executive Director, of US BCSD.
While Materials Marketplace focuses on upcycling building materials waste from small businesses, and government agencies (including cities and local non-profit organizations), Rheaply brings circularity to furniture, fixtures, and equipment for large corporations like Google, Target, AbbVie, and Nicor, offering a solution to sustainable procurement and investment recovery through a combination of internal and external reuse. Rheaply’s platform is designed to help organizations locate what they need from other divisions of their company, avoiding both the long wait times associated with global supply chain disruptions and disposing of materials in perfect, usable condition. With the acquisition of the Materials Marketplace, the waste streams available for reuse and exchange are exponentially higher when factoring in construction surplus, deconstructed materials, and by-products from manufacturing operations.
To date, over 50,000 items with a value of $19 million have been upcycled through the platform, diverting more than 20 metric tons of waste from landfills. Since Q2 2021, the company’s growth is up 185% and by 72% year over year net revenue.
“We are very grateful that Andy and the US BCSD have entrusted us with building on what they’ve created with the Materials Marketplace so far. With around 20% of all US waste headed to landfill coming from commercial construction projects, we must think about the next wave of buildings to be built with the things that we already have above ground and the things that are already in our community. It makes clear economic sense, empowering reuse creates 20-30 more jobs than traditional waste management solutions such as landfill or even recycling. If those jobs can actually make our communities more self-reliant on their own supply chains and not global supply chains, and if we can also do that by reducing the things that go to the landfill, it’s at least a triple bottom line win,” said Rheaply Founder and CEO Garry Cooper.
Materials Marketplace currently operates in Texas, Tennessee, Ohio, Ontario, Michigan, and Washington, and the acquisition will lead to rapid expansion. Reply is currently piloting a similar waste and resource management program in San Francisco. Since its inception, the Materials Marketplace™ has diverted 9,200 tons of waste from landfills.
With this acquisition and additional product advancements, Rheaply plans to develop next-generation technology, making asset reuse more accessible to organizations of all shapes and sizes. Additionally, Reply recently introduced a tool that allows users to view the estimated embodied carbon avoided by reusing items, contextualizing the environmental benefit in hard data.
With Material Marketplace’s reputation and work in various cities and states, Rheaply will come closer to offering its reuse platform in 50 cities in the United States by the beginning of 2024.
