"Junk Matters" to this Wofford student

For Wofford junior Joseph McMillin, a school project has turned into a promising green business. The Spartanburg native and psychology major recently launched “Junk Matters, LLC” a recycling service catering to local schools and businesses. His mission: to help organizations take junk destined for landfills and recycle it instead. What makes his service different? McMillin hauls away recyclables for free.

“A lot of companies don’t want to or can’t afford to pay to have their recycling picked-up,” says McMillin. There’s a huge gap in the collection area between the client and the recycling plants. I want to give these businesses an opportunity to recycle anything they want to dispose of in an environmentally friendly manner.”

The idea for a free recycling service came to McMillin after spending time with James Meadors, Sr. ’81, father of McMillin’s friend James Meadors, Jr. ’12, and the owner of a thriving Charleston construction company specializing in green building practices. “Here’s this successful guy, and I noticed him picking up scrap metal on the side of the road, and I asked him why he did it. He told me he could recycle it and make money,” says McMillin.

The blend of earth-friendly and enterprise appealed to McMillin, who needed to develop a project for his involvement in the Success Initiative, a program within Wofford’s Mungo Center for Professional Excellence that teaches students innovation and creative thinking. His project advisor, Scott Cochran ’88, Dean of The Mungo Center for Professional Excellence, encouraged him to reach out to alumni and business leaders for advice on how to get his fledgling company off the ground.

“I’m not a business major; I went into this totally blind,” McMillin says. “I learned how to do it by talking with Scott and the contacts I made at recycling companies. They told me the business was growing and that if I worked hard, I’d be successful. Fifty percent of my business comes from Wofford contacts.”

“I’m incredibly impressed with what Joseph has been able to accomplish in such a short time,” says Cochran. “His company represents exactly what we’re teaching our SI [Success Initiative] students – to find something they’re passionate about and use that passion to solve problems and create opportunities.”

Beginning in March with one client (a Spartanburg County school where his mother teaches), a pick-up truck and a trailer, McMillin now has 40 clients, two trucks and trailers, and one employee: his pal James Meadors, Jr. The two work an average of 25-30 hours each week. The proceeds from selling their collected materials to recycling plants have grown from barely enough to cover gas to enough to pay each student a small salary – with some left over for charity. McMillin donates a portion of his profits to a local high school scholarship fund named for a close friend who was killed in an automobile accident.

“I particularly wanted to donate to a scholarship fund because education is the foundation of recycling practices and the development of green technologies,” says McMillin. “And I know Wofford alumni give back more than alumni at other schools.”
Running a growing business as a full-time student has come at a personal cost to McMillin. A walk-on inside linebacker for the Wofford Terriers football team, he played in the 2010 season and had plans to return this year. Just before summer practice began, he made the difficult decision to give up his place on the team in order to focus on his business.

“Yeah, that was tough,” he says. “But football, the business and school were three full-time jobs. Something had to give.”

For now, McMillin continues to balance school and work. When he’s not attending class or studying, he’s busy sending emails, attending client meetings and hauling junk. To find additional operating capital, he’s participating in Venture, another Mungo Center for Professional Excellence program that matches students with business and community leaders who provide guidance about business development and provide funding to the winner of an annual business plan competition.

“Being a poor college kid makes it hard to buy equipment and expand only on what you’re earning,” he says. “But I’m going to stick with this. There’s nothing like the feeling I get when I see how much waste we’re keeping out of the landfills in just one day’s worth of work.”