Trash gets ‘a second life’ at Beaumont-area dump’s retail store

| Contributing Writer

About 25 people stood in line at Lamb Canyon Landfill near Beaumont on a warm morning in late September, eyeing items set out for sale at an unusual outdoor store.

"It's like the start of a race," quipped Yucaipa resident Wayne Groves, one of those in line.

As Riverside County Department of Waste Resources workers declared the Found It Again Reuse Store open for business Saturday, Sept. 28, Groves and the others walked fast toward the recycled merchandise.

Within minutes, they were lining up again to pay for bicycles, barbecue grills, lawn chairs, golf clubs, exercise equipment, landscaping tools, stereo speakers and a drum set, among other items.

Beaumont resident Edwin Vargas, a drummer in a Moreno Valley church worship band shopping for a full acoustic set on which to practice, couldn't believe the price he paid for the used set.

"Twenty bucks," Vargas said. "Can't beat that."

San Bernardino's Aimee Gonzales paid $10 each for a pair of used bicycles for her two youngest children, who are 10 and 12 years old.

"They're growing into the bigger bikes now," Gonzales said, and the ones she bought were "in such good shape."

Riverside resident Angel Pereyra teamed with neighbors to fill the bed of his truck with two grills, four bicycles, one tricycle, a speaker and a miniature refrigerator, plus a punching dummy for 14-year-old son Adam.

"Who did that packing job?" neighbor Simon Arroyo asked approvingly, as he and Pereyra squeezed the last bike onto the truck.

"We made out like bandits," Arroyo said.

Cast-offs find a second life

The Found It Again Reuse Store, which debuted in March, sells items — by design — at very low prices, said Joe Laffoon, a crew lead worker at the landfill who manages the store.

The goal isn't to make money, Laffoon said, but to prevent items from needlessly taking up space in the landfill.

"We want to save the landfill for actual trash," said Lisa Thompson, environmental compliance manager for the Department of Waste Resources.

"It's unbelievable what gets thrown out," Thompson said. "Many of these things are still in good condition. They are working well. And there is no reason for them to end up at the landfill."

It is satisfying to give an item "a second life," she added.

Employees keep their eyes open for things brought to the landfill with the potential for being reused, and set them aside — with owners' permission — for the store, Thompson said. Employees check to make sure items are in working order.

Because the store is labor intensive and depends on an adequate number of items being available for sale, it's open for business one Saturday morning a month. That's usually the last Saturday, Thompson said, though exceptions are made when there are holidays.

This month, for example, the store is set to open Saturday, Nov. 23 — the weekend before Thanksgiving, she said.

Thompson said the store won't open in December because of the busy Christmas and New Year's holiday season.

The last-Saturday-of-the-month pattern will return in January, she said.

'Throw-away society' stocks store

Thompson said the reuse store has been in the works for a long time, but a planned rollout a few years ago was shelved when the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

"Finally, this year we have been able to get it up and running," she said.

So far, officials said, the program is doing what they hoped it would.

Thompson said that, from its spring inception through September, the store recorded 104 transactions, or sales, for 422 total items sold. That, she said, prevented nearly 5 tons of material from being buried in the landfill.

Sales also brought in $3,052, she said.

On a typical Saturday customers snatch up about 80% of the items put out for sale, Laffoon said.

"The public has really responded to it," he said.

The last Saturday in September was particularly busy, as customers purchased 121 items, Thompson said.

On that day, a landfill employee urged customers to be patient if a particular item for which they were looking wasn't available that day, saying it likely would be later.

Groves, the customer from Yucaipa, said his patience was rewarded that Saturday, when he snatched up a lawnmower.

"I've been waiting three months for this," he said.

Then Groves hopped on a bicycle he'd just bought and rode a couple times around the small parking lot where the store is set up.

"I haven't been on a bike in 50, 60 years," said Groves, who is 76.

Groves said he has been coming every month since the March rollout. He likes the idea of the store.

"We live in a throw-away society and it's not sustainable."

ABOUT THE STORE

What: Found It Again Reuse Store

Where: Lamb Canyon Landfill, 16411 Lamb Canyon Road, near Beaumont

When: Open 9 a.m. to noon on the last non-holiday weekend of the month from January through November. It will be closed in December.

How: Purchases are by credit card only.

Instructions: Visitors should check in at the gate fee booth/scale house before entering the landfill. They should wear a high-visibility safety vest and closed-toe shoes. Vests are provided for those who don't have them.

Information: