August Newsletter: The O-Town Community Flexes Their Muscles


Featured Subscriber: KOS Coffee & Bodega

Who doesn’t enjoy sipping coffee in an intimate setting? Maybe you need to pick-up some wine or a last-minute gift? When you visit KOS Coffee & Bodega on Fairbanks Ave., across from Rollins College’s campus, you can do all this and more while knowing that your purchase is contributing towards environmental and charitable causes. KOS has been composting its coffee grounds and other organic scraps with O-Town Compost since January of 2022. KOS Coffee’s owner, Russell, was shocked when told that the shop had already diverted 659 pounds from the landfill, proving just how quickly organic scraps can add up even in a small coffee shop.

KOS is short for a Norwegian word that translates to coziness, or being “content, connected, and around those you love.” Besides a dedication to creating quality products, KOS is also passionate about supporting charities and initiatives that help change the world. This was one of the reasons owner Russell decided to seek out a composting service. After some research, he discovered the convenient services offered by O-Town Compost and started service right away.

KOS is also working towards becoming a zero-waste certified business, and that’s where composting comes in the play. From an operational standpoint, not having to deal with transporting messy coffee grounds out to the dumpster daily helps their staff a lot. According to Russell, O-Town’s service makes it extremely easy. Their bucket is kept in a convenient spot behind the coffee bar. Each Friday an O-Town Compost driver arrives with a new clean bucket and takes the full one, leaving KOS with a blank slate for the weekend ahead.

When asked if he would like to see more businesses in the Central Florida area participating in composting, Russell’s reply was “100% yes.” He believes that there are so many small things that everyone can be doing individually to change the direction we are going environmentally. We couldn’t agree more, and are so happy to have KOS as a subscriber. Check out their website at ChooseKOS.com to see all the amazing things they have going on – or better yet, visit them in person! Not only does KOS have great monthly subscriptions available for items like coffee bags and wine, but they recently started an unlimited in-store coffee subscription for only $40 monthly! For anyone who drinks coffee daily, that’s a deal!

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O-Town subscribers! Each month we want to highlight subscribers that are standing out as waste warriors in our composting community. If you are interested in being featured, send us a direct message or e-mail us at info@o-towncompost.com.


Get Involved in The Community…

Native Planting at Honeymoon Island State Park

Join IDEAS For Us and Keep Pinellas Beautiful in planting native grasses and sea oats throughout Honeymoon Island State Park! Planting these native plants will serve to rejuvenate the ecosystem for the wildlife and contribute to the resilience of the soil from storms.

Shoreline Restoration at Ulele Springs

Join IDEAS For Us and Ecosphere in a shoreline planting at Ulele Springs. We will be removing some invasive, planting 1000 bareroot shoreline plants, and cleaning up the area to completely revitalize the space.


Composting Advocacy Opportunities

To achieve the goal of a Zero Waste Central Florida, it’s going to take political advocacy and action at the community grassroots level. Going forward, we want to bring together our subscribers, who are willing to write, call, and canvass for political change in support of food waste recycling.

Our subscribers are already doing a lot, diverting their household’s food scraps from the landfill, and deserve all the praise. Although, to live in a zero waste society, we need to unify our voice.

Click on the link below, and send us an email letting us know you’re interested in joining the Composting Advocacy Group, and we’ll be in touch shortly with more information about our efforts. Members of The Compost Advocacy Group will be subject to discounts, and promo codes.

I'm interested in being more active in further composting in Central Florida. CLICK HERE.


Referral Bonus Increased to Give $15, Get $15

Send a friend or neighbor your referral link, and both parties get $15 off!

Step 1: Sign into your customer portal HERE

Step 2: Click on the “Give $15, Get $15” tab to access your link

Step 3: Copy your unique link, and send it to friend, share it to your HOA group, or on social media.


O-Town Compost had a busy July!


Waste Diversion Abound! O-Town's Special Recycling Service On The Scene

The new, one of a kind service has officially launched for our 500+ subscribers. Customers can log in to their customer portal, access the shop, and select from among 7 different hard-to-recycle items.

Batteries, light bulbs, paint, plastic film, textiles, small electronics, and wires & cords.

We’ve had this idea for awhile, but weren’t ready to execute on it until we were in a comfortable spot with our composting service. O-Town’s primary focus remains with the collection and composting of organic waste, but we’re always looking to add value for our dedicated subscribers.

What’s important to us is giving folks access to recycling programs that are convenient. That’s why people often refer to state’s like Colorado, Washington, and Oregon as being ahead of Florida in environmentalism. There are just more policies and programs in place, plus companies like Ridwell, are in place to shape the culture.

The Southeastern region of the United States has the highest waste per capita in the nation. We are slowing changing the throw-away culture into one that is conscious of what goes to the landfill. We’re so grateful for our community of waste warriors.

Episode 30. Joseph McMillan - CEO of Atlas Organics

Atlas Organics is a big fish when it comes to commercial composting and expanding food waste recycling infrastructure in the Southeast. Their CEO, Joe, joined Charlie on the podcast to discuss their plans for growth in Tampa and how they leveraged equity investors to take their game to the next level.

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Spring Compost Giveback is Live!

If you are an O-Town subscriber, it’s time to claim your free share of compost in your customer portal. Subscribers will be able to order a share throughout March from the shop in your customer portal. See instructions below to order your share today. Happy planting y’all. 🌱🌻🌺

The top right corner of our website, login to your account.

Click the button above labeled “shop.”

Add the product “Compost Giveback Spring 2022” to your cart, and check out. The share of compost will be delivered on your next service date.

Episode 29. Lanette - Fertile Earth Worm Farm (Homestead, FL)

Lanette is a a special lady who understands the waste industry like she understands the regenerative agricultural movement, very well. In this episode, she shares how she’s able to process upwards of 25 tons per week of food waste, and her journey from the very beginning.

Episode 27. Neil Seldman - Institute of Local Self Reliance

Listen to this great episode with Neil Seldman, one of the most knowledgeable people on the history of environmentalism and waste in the United States. This article, Monopoly and the U.S. Waste Knot, influenced Charlie to change the direction in his career, and focus on community composting as a solution to breakup the centralization of waste management.

Episode 26. New Earth Farm - John Cline

John is a self-proclaimed novice when it comes to composting and running a micro-hauling company. That didn’t stop him from starting New Earth Farm’s community composting initiative in St. Louis, MO. He asks the right questions, and doesn’t jump into decisions. Although, community composting is a passion, for it to be successful, you can’t think of it as a hobby, and John is doing a great job.

Episode #25. Tim Bennett - Bennett Compost (Philly, PA)

Bennett Compost in Philadelphia, PA sets an example for the rest of us community composters who may have only started in the last few years. Tim Bennett and his team have grown to over 5,000 composters, and have partnered with the City to aggressively target and recycle food scraps. They also do a fair-share of their collections by bicycle!

Take a listen to this week’s episode as Charlie talks with one of the greats.

Episode #24. Brenda Platt - Institute of Local Self Reliance

Brenda Platt directs ILSR’s Composting for Community project, which is advancing locally based composting in order to create jobs, enhance soils, sequester carbon, reduce waste, and build more resilient and healthy communities. She has worked 33 years fighting trash burners and promoting waste reduction, reuse, recycling and composting, particularly recycling-based jobs.

Episode #23. Java Compost

Married and with three kids, it’s incredible what the owners of Java Compost have accomplished in the 2+ years since they began. After New Jersey declared a statewide Organics Recycling Mandate they are in an ideal position to push composting forward in their region.

Buckle up for another episode of The Community Composting Podcast.

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Make Your Holidays Green! - O-Town Compost Gift Cards

The holidays don’t have to be a time for over-consumption putting more strain on mother earth.

Help O-Town Compost spread the community composting movement, and get your special someone a gift card for our convenient composting service. It’s the gift that the environment can approve of, and keeps on giving, as food scraps turn into rich soil.

Episode 21. Cowboy Compost - Fort Worth, TX

A key partnership with the City of Fort Worth has put Cowboy Compost in a position where they are diverting a significant amount of food waste from the landfill. Listen as co-founder, Miguel, talks about his philosophy on running a community composting business.

Episode #20. Dirt Hugger Compost (Dallesport, WA)

Pierce and his co-founder started Dirt Hugger not having experience driving a front-end loader, or having an idea which avenue of composting they wanted to focus. Most of us community composters start with a buck-shot of ideas, and it’s important for us to narrow it down.

Dirt Hugger Compost is turning thousands of tons of organic waste from Oregon and Washington into a beautifully rich compost, and distributing it to gardeners in the Columbia River Gorge.