They are saying one man’s trash is one other man’s treasure, however for somebody like Warren Fryefield, it’s each.
Fryefield is the co-founder and co-owner of Group Disposal in Springfield. Subsequent yr, it should have a good time its twentieth anniversary.
Based with companion and school buddy Jeff Warner, the corporate collects waste from dumpsters, curbsides and trash compactors at industrial websites and multifamily communities and supplies industrial yard waste pickup companies.
Its purchasers vary from domestically owned mom-and-pop companies to world companies headquartered in Jacksonville.
Its group companions embrace the Jacksonville Icemen, Jacksonville Arboretum & Botanical Gardens and the First Coast Residence Affiliation.
“We’re Jacksonville’s solely domestically owned waste-hauling firm,” mentioned Fryefield, 41.
“Something the massive guys can do, we are able to do.”
In keeping with its web site, Group Disposal supplies “top-notch, trustworthy, and dependable service to our clients, and the outcomes will converse for themselves. We found different firms failed to fulfill the particular wants of particular person communities.”
The corporate has 10 staff.
A Jacksonville native, Fryefield is the son of the late Circuit Choose Peter Fryefield, who died in 2009.
Warren Fryefield at Group Disposal in Springfield. He additionally owns the Riverside bar and arcade Keg & Coin.
Warren Fryefield attended Stanton School Preparatory Faculty and the College of Florida, the place he earned a bachelor’s diploma in worldwide economics.
He married “an Ortega lady” and is the daddy of 5- and 2-year-olds.
Along with Group Disposal, he owns Riverside bar and arcade Keg & Coin.
Did he assume he’d make his fortune in rubbish?
“Not an opportunity. I get that query quite a bit,” Fryefield mentioned. “Folks marvel, ‘How did you find yourself doing this?’ It’s not for everyone, that’s for positive. We had a man present up one morning, and he lasted 15 seconds.”
The corporate began as a enterprise that offered residential companies, together with strain washing and door-side pickup at flats. Ultimately, the 94-unit multifamily group Beauclerc Lakes requested whether or not the corporate may take its waste to the landfill.
“We thought, ‘We will do this. Why not?’” Fryefield mentioned. “We purchased a trailer. We already had pickup vehicles, and we began doing that.”
Beauclerc Lakes stays below contract.
“With most companies, they are saying you assume you’re going to do one factor, and you find yourself in one thing tangentially associated,” Fryefield mentioned.
“The instance I all the time give is you assume you’re going to be a sandwich store, however you find yourself turning into a bakery.”
In 2010, the corporate outgrew its Southside location and moved to 346 E. eleventh St., north of Downtown.
Fryefield mentioned nearly all of its enterprise is in Jacksonville, however Group Disposal is licensed in Clay County as effectively.
Till there may be extra “route density” to permit for extra stops in areas like Inexperienced Cove Springs, Fleming Island and Orange Park, Duval County is the place the corporate intends to develop.
“There’s a lot room for progress in Jacksonville,” he mentioned.
“It’s nearly getting extra vehicles on the street and getting extra contracts. I don’t wish to say it’s fundamental, however each enterprise makes trash. Each particular person makes trash. So there may be loads of alternative. It’s actually about scaling all of it up.”
As for any negatives of being within the waste-hauling enterprise, Fryefield factors to 1.
“Loads of days I come residence and have needed to strip exterior,” he mentioned.
“One of many rougher components is if you get residence with younger children, they usually wish to come up and offer you a hug, and you must say, ‘Not as we speak.’”
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