When I was a kid one way, other than cutting lawns, to make a little extra money was to recycle cans and bottles. I spent hours stomping aluminum cans down to a 1/4 inch to make more fit in the bag. My parents helped by taking me to the recycling center to turn them in. Today that concept is still in place. There are more and more recycling centers around that take glass, aluminum, and scrap metal in exchange for money. But now you are able to recycle things for money that in the old days would go to the landfill.

There is a company that refurbishes cell phones and gives them to 3rd world countries. They will send you the box postage paid, you give them the phone and the charger, and they send you a check. There are many companies that will pay you to send them your old ink and toner cartridges. They are expensive to produce, so these companies recycle the shell and just add new contents and re-sell them and pay you for them. I saw a power company that was taking old working refrigerators and recycling them in exchange for $30. You can recycle rechargable batteries like laptop batteries, even car batteries that I thought could not be recycled, and get cash for them.

There is another company that is paying with gift certificates and coupons for recycling items that you may already recycle. They provide you with a recycling bin, you place your unsorted items in the bin, when the truck comes by the bin is weighed. The bin has a chip inside and you are credited for the weight of your normal recycling. It’s not available in all states yet, but they are expanding. The more I research it, the more items I find that not only can be recycled, but there are companies willing to pay you for them. Those companies win because it’s much cheaper for them to refurbish an item and re-sell it than to produce a new one. Not to mention they can then make the statement in their marketing that they are a green business.  So before you throw away anything do a little research and you may be able to put a little cash in your pocket.

Related Posts:
1. Earn Cash Back and Rewards When Dining Out
2. Ways to Earn Extra Cash
3. Makin’ “Green” Waves

Did you know that you could earn cash back and rewards when you go out to eat?  Not many people know about dining rewards so I though I would share them with you.  I have been using two free dining reward programs for a couple of years – http://www.opentable.com/ and www.rewardsnetwork.com.  Open Table is a restaurant reservation website that you can earn reservation points that are in turn redeemable for restaurant gift certificates.  Rewards Network is a program in which you choose your reward program such as cash back or airline miles and receive these rewards when you dine at participating restaurants.

Before I go out to eat, I visit the Open Table website to see if the restaurant I am going to is on the website.  If it is, I make the reservation, fulfill it, and get 100 points deposited in my Open Table account.  The first redeemable level is a $20 dining check for 2,000 points or twenty 100 point reservations.  Open Table also has 1,000 point reservations for select restaurants which make it easier to accumulate dining points.

For the Rewards Network program, I chose the cash back program so I earn 5% of the total food bill at participating restaurants.  The reward percentage is debited back on the credit card I paid with.  Since enrolling in the program in 2007, I have had over $100 debited back to my credit card.

There are many other choices for the Rewards Network dining rewards programs such as airline miles, college savings, hotel points, and contributions.  All you have to do to enroll is to register all of your debit and credit cards when you sign up for your account.  Every time you use your credit card at a participating restaurant, the cash back, airline miles, etc. will be deposited into your account.

Dine out and start seeing the rewards today!

Photo Credit: DiscoverDuPage

Related Posts:
1. Ways to Earn Extra Cash
2. Earn Cash Recycling…The New Way
3. Cash In On Used Technology