# Why don't Games Workshop recycle?



## Cocakoala (Apr 27, 2009)

Going through all the sprues I have collected over the years the thought came to me 'why dont Games Workshop have some sort of system where you can recycle these old bits of plastic?'

So why don't they do it? It would help them financially as plastics are increasing in price it seems and they could also then have the boast about using recycled plastics. It would also free some of my space up.

Or do they allready do it but just don't talk about it?

Also anyone kow what I can do with the old bits of sprue I have? Taken all the actuall parts off them and now I'm reluctant to just throw them away.

Thanks for any answers.


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## Lord Rahl (Mar 13, 2010)

Gw dont see the point in recycling, to them its just another way to up their already overpriced plastics range. They wouldnt actually benefit from it in any sort of way unless they started charging for the service.

You could always make some terrain and use the sprues for rubble, chop it into small pieces and pile it up to represent rubble in a city or some other building.


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## GrizBe (May 12, 2010)

I actually wondered this myself and sent them an email to the effect some time ago... I never got a reply.

I worked out that the left over sprue plastic from a tactical squad weighed nearly the same as the actual models, so in effect, you could make a second squad out of it.

I mean... all they'd have to do is have a collection bin at the stores, which is picked up when they make a delivery since the delivery truck has to go back to the depot eventually anyway... then melting down the plastic to remould is much cheaper and less energy consuming and greener then making new plastic.. plus, it most countries they'd get tax rebates etc for green measures... Its realy stupid they don't do it as it would save them alot of money on raw resources.


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## Marneus Calgar (Dec 5, 2007)

Because they have not a lot to gain by recycling, you can only recyle the plastic into crappy things like rulers, and general stationary. The plastic itself is recyclable, but I don't think it would be worth much to GW. Basically, you won't be able to melt it down, and make more models, it basically doesn't work like that. I think its something to do with the chemicals and all that, they basically become less and less "pure" as it gets recycled, thats why bottles can't be recycled into more bottles...


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## cain the betrayer (Oct 12, 2009)

i found this some time ago on heresy i never tryed it but maybe it worth it
http://www.wargamesfactory.com/recycle


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

From what i remember GW do recycle the sprues but you have to drop them in to warhammer world, besides whats wrong with just putting them in to your own recycling bin? thats were mine go along with all the card.


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## Azezel (May 23, 2010)

For reasons of chemistry to complex to explain polystyrene is damned hard to recycle. The best that can normally be done is adding it to some other thermosoftening plastic and making something out of the mixture.

It also uses more energy (that is, burned oil) to recycle than it would save in raw materials.

Sorry.


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## Cadian81st (Dec 24, 2006)

cain the betrayer said:


> i found this some time ago on heresy i never tryed it but maybe it worth it
> http://www.wargamesfactory.com/recycle


This actually looks like a really cool program. Best i've seen so far for recycling minis at least.


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

Im very sceptical about the whole recycling methods used in my country, several documentary's and countless pages of news stories in recent years have damaged my desire to recycle, it came to a serious head last year when we saved loads of paper and card and such and bagged it up for a "special" post christmas recycle collection which was widely advertised in my area, only fo my wife who was driving to work very early on collection day to witness the collectors chucking all the card and paper people had seperated in to the normal bin wagon with the normal rubbish destined for land fill, begged the question what was the point?


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

Cadian81st said:


> This actually looks like a really cool program. Best i've seen so far for recycling minis at least.


i dont know, sending your unwanted plastic by mail to a company who will melt it down and sell it back to you feels very wrong.


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## neilbatte (Jan 2, 2008)

GW recall all their out of date models from stockists when they replace a range so there's a good possibility that these get recyled otherwise they'd lose money on them.
I doubt they'd call for a plastic sprue amnesty though as most would expect something in return which would probably cost them more than they would save by recycling the old sprues.


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## Cadian81st (Dec 24, 2006)

bitsandkits said:


> i dont know, sending your unwanted plastic by mail to a company who will melt it down and sell it back to you feels very wrong.


As discussed above, you can't turn sprues into more models, the plastic is degraded too much in the recycling process. Its like how when you recycle computer paper, it comes out as newspaper or toilet paper, definitely not the same thing.


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## Varakir (Sep 2, 2009)

Cadian81st said:


> As discussed above, you can't turn sprues into more models, the plastic is degraded too much in the recycling process. Its like how when you recycle computer paper, it comes out as newspaper or toilet paper, definitely not the same thing.


They do actually say on that site that they are using the plastic to make models with. It's likely they are adding it to more plastic though, as Azezel said, and using this as a selling gimmick.



> Im very sceptical about the whole recycling methods used in my country,


Whereabouts are you? Our recycling service is pretty good, and by the end of this year they are finally collecting card and plastic curbside as well. (the stuff we usually have a decent amount of)


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## Azezel (May 23, 2010)

bitsandkits said:


> begged the question what was the point?


Digression: 'begging the question' doesn't mean what you think it means.


On topic: It feels good.

No, seriously, people like recycling - it feels good, gives them a glow. Far more often than you might imagine, that's about all the good it does (It's often actively harmful for the environment) - but making people feel good is actually a good thing. People should feel good. There's little enough in life that can give people the sense that they're _doing the right thing_ so let 'em have this one.


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## Cadian81st (Dec 24, 2006)

Varakir said:


> They do actually say on that site that they are using the plastic to make models with. It's likely they are adding it to more plastic though, as Azezel said, and using this as a selling gimmick.


Oh, missed that part. Ah well, I'm not using my mountains of sprues, if they can get something out of them and save a bit of the planet, that doesn't sound too terrible to me.


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

Varakir said:


> They do actually say on that site that they are using the plastic to make models with. It's likely they are adding it to more plastic though, as Azezel said, and using this as a selling gimmick.
> 
> 
> 
> Whereabouts are you? Our recycling service is pretty good, and by the end of this year they are finally collecting card and plastic curbside as well. (the stuff we usually have a decent amount of)


its not the service i have issue with its whats done with the materials i send for recycling, alot of it is getting land filled anyway, or been shipped to India and other third world countries who will also land fill it but they charge our local authorities for the privilege, so to help the environment we put unnecessary packing into the recycling bin which is picked up in a truck, taken to a depo and compacted and bundled, driven to the docks and whacked on to a cargo ship and sailed around the world were it ends up in a hole in the ground and my council tax pays some indian official for the privilege, later on a industrious local scavenges through your recycled papers and finds a discarded credit card statement....... well you know the rest


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

Azezel said:


> Digression: 'begging the question' doesn't mean what you think it means.


Depends if im using its true definition or the less accepted but common modern usage,which i was


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## Azezel (May 23, 2010)

bitsandkits said:


> Depends if im using its true definition or the less accepted but common modern usage,which i was


Yeah, but I'm a pedantic sod...


Anyway - the bit about shipping stuff to India to be buried is pretty much on the money. In fact, it's not even the worst of the anti-green recycling out there.

There's a reason why the environmental battle cry has always been '*Reduce*, *Reuse*, Recycle' in that order.

It's up to GW to reduce - to look at every new mould they plan and find away to pare away at the amount of wasted plastic. As for reusing, behold the Spruecrons! That guy is the greenest 40k player of them all.


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## Varakir (Sep 2, 2009)

bitsandkits said:


> its not the service i have issue with its whats done with the materials i send for recycling, alot of it is getting land filled anyway, or been shipped to India and other third world countries who will also land fill it but they charge our local authorities for the privilege, so to help the environment we put unnecessary packing into the recycling bin which is picked up in a truck, taken to a depo and compacted and bundled, driven to the docks and whacked on to a cargo ship and sailed around the world were it ends up in a hole in the ground and my council tax pays some indian official for the privilege, later on a industrious local scavenges through your recycled papers and finds a discarded credit card statement....... well you know the rest


Well i like to think it's being recycled responsibly, i try to stop myself being cynical as i don't know the truth so there is some chance it's being done properly....

Most of the documentaries i've seen with 'recycled' waste being shipped off to india & africa has been from industrial wastage. It's really sickening stuff to watch, especially the kids who make their living scavenging electronics from our old crap. The companies who are setting themselves up as 'charities' now and 'recycling' unwanted clothes are pretty messed up as well.

Spruecons are genius, this is definitely the way forward.


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## Cadian81st (Dec 24, 2006)

I most make sprue rubble out of mine, but I might have to build a spruecons army now. Just for kicks.


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## kickthetv643 (Aug 20, 2010)

GW dont recycle because it would cost them money to look green and spending money isnt a profit making plan so they wont do it! and to whoever said u cant recycle plastic bottles back into plastic bottles your wrong. watched a how its made episode on discovery channel this morning and they made a recycled plastic bottle from other plastic bottles, just a lower grade plastic one then the original.


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## chromedog (Oct 31, 2007)

LEGO recycle.
It's worth it to them. All of the offcuts when each piece comes out of the press get ground up and used as "filler" for another batch of that colour.

They can do this with their plastic (which is a different one to Styrene) and they do it in-house. 

It's NOT cost-effective to GW to do this. They do it at WHW, but nowhere else. IT isn't worth the extra costs to have it shipped back to them (I don't think they can reprocess it, so it would have to go to a third-party who would sell it back to them).


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## GrizBe (May 12, 2010)

Thing is though... the delivery trucks HAVE to go back to the depot though... wouldn't be that difficult to just add on the recycling since the trucks have to travel back anyway. Plus... they'd get tax rebates etc for being green. I really am surprised they don't recycle...


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## The Boz (Aug 16, 2010)

Not everything can be recycled.


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## Jezlad (Oct 14, 2006)

All my waste gets thrown into the bin and buried in the ground.

I don't recyle fuck all and never will. 

If the government expect me to sift through shit every week to "save the planet" when places like China don't give a toss they're insane.

Fuck the planet. :wink:


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## Doelago (Nov 29, 2009)

Jezlad said:


> All my waste gets thrown into the bin and buried in the ground.
> 
> I don't recyle fuck all and never will.
> 
> ...



Roflmao... :laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh: Well said!


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## Stella Cadente (Dec 25, 2006)

I feel the same way, but round here if you don't sort all you recycle shit out properly into the correct color coded boxes the council come round and give you a fine, so you gotta do it here if you don't wanna fork out cash, despite the fact recycling is fictional bollocks created to make people feel they make a difference when they don't do jack shit, recycling 100 bottles to make 1 bottle costs allot more money, and burns more resources than just making 100 new bloody bottles.

GW may be money grabbing asses with no customer service concept, but there not dumb enough to waste time making recycled models, in all likelyhood all these sprues are being used to make terrain back at the HQ so they can post it in WD and say "look we made terrain out of all the sprue you sent us, you could of done this instead, but now you can spend £23 buying more marines to actually do this"


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## Azezel (May 23, 2010)

kickthetv643 said:


> GW dont recycle because it would cost them money to look green and spending money isnt a profit making plan so they wont do it! and to whoever said u cant recycle plastic bottles back into plastic bottles your wrong. watched a how its made episode on discovery channel this morning and they made a recycled plastic bottle from other plastic bottles, just a lower grade plastic one then the original.


a) What was the point of necroing this old warhorse?

b) Most plastic bottles are made of polyethylene terephthalate (take a look, it'll have a triangle with 'PET' in it) - which can be recycled _fairly_ efficiently, albeit with some impurity problems due to very high temperatures involved (long story).

GW plastic kits are made from polystyrene - which is a complete pig to recycle. The best case scenario is to add a little bit of old to a lot of new polystyrene, and even that produces a noticably inferior product, which itself cannot be recycled at all.

To imagine that 'plastic' (which is a misnomer) is a single substance and that anything made of plastic is identical to anything else made of plastic is a mistake.


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## TheReverend (Dec 2, 2007)

bitsandkits said:


> i dont know, sending your unwanted plastic by mail to a company who will melt it down and sell it back to you feels very wrong.


think that's wrong, well GW does actually recycle, they have a 'sprue bin' at warhammer world where you can drop your unwanted sprue bits in there. i think their tag line when they tried to sell this to the public was "watch out for your donated bits turning up as awesome scenery in white dwarf"
what, you think i'm gonna put half a dozen unused space marines back in the bin?:scratchhead:


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## nightfish (Feb 16, 2009)

bitsandkits said:


> Im very sceptical about the whole recycling methods used in my country, several documentary's and countless pages of news stories in recent years have damaged my desire to recycle, it came to a serious head last year when we saved loads of paper and card and such and bagged it up for a "special" post christmas recycle collection which was widely advertised in my area, only fo my wife who was driving to work very early on collection day to witness the collectors chucking all the card and paper people had seperated in to the normal bin wagon with the normal rubbish destined for land fill, begged the question what was the point?


Don't you have seperate bins now? I've three for different things


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## cain the betrayer (Oct 12, 2009)

just noticed that the title is wrong shouldn't it be ''why doesn't games workshop recycle''

but like said if its so hard to recycle then why bother to do it at all even more if it costs you mean money?


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## Azezel (May 23, 2010)

cain the betrayer said:


> just noticed that the title is wrong shouldn't it be ''why doesn't games workshop recycle''
> 
> but like said if its so hard to recycle then why bother to do it at all even more if it costs you mean money?



I already answered this question.

Tell me, when was the last time you felt that warm glow that says 'I just did something good.'?

Most of us rarely get the chance. Most of the time, recycling isn't good, in fact, it's actively harmful to the environment (*most* of the time. some recycling is good, glass and aluminium for example).

People like to recycle because it makes them feel good - they don't know it's bad, so it gives them that warm good deed feeling.

and that really is worthwhile. People should feel good.


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