Month: July 2018

We’re in the junk removal business. Let’s face it; it’s not one of the more glamorous careers, and it certainly won’t garner us any oohs and aahs at a cocktail party. The very nature of our job can cause us to be humble.

But humble goes a lot farther in our book. It is one of the 40 Core Values in 123JUNK’s Culture of Excellence that every employee must embrace and adhere to.

As junkmen, we have no grandiose ideas about hauling junk. We do, however, put great stock in how we treat our customers. We are often humbled by the praise we receive for our attitude, our respectful staff, and our attention to detail.

We are humbled by the circumstances that some people have which require our respect and sometimes discretion. We often help families clear out a home in which a love one has died or a couple is going through a divorce.

We feel humble when we deliver a load of furniture to one of our charity partners and see how the donation helps fund their programs to build homes or provide household goods for immigrant families. We take the time to speak to our charity partners to learn their missions, and feature them on our blog and website. We want everyone in the company to see first-hand how our work affects others.

What Does Being Humble Mean?

Mirriam-Webster may define the word humble as meaning low or meek, but to 123JUNK, it means anything but. We don’t view our service as being lower than others. If you could see the type of relief on the faces of the people we serve as a response to our visit, you would see just how important our services are. It is a great relief for them to be able to call one resource to unload what could be a lifetime of accumulation. They don’t have to sort through their possessions to divide them into donations, recyclables, or trash. We do that for them. At the end of each pickup, we sort through each piece to determine if we can donate it to our charity partners, deliver it to the recycling center, or leave it at the landfill. It’s our 3-step disposal process.

The dictionary also defines the word humble as meaning not proud or arrogant. As proud as we are of our work ethic, we are humble in the recognition that it is a dirty and sometimes dangerous job. So we take every safety precaution for both our workers and our clients. We even provide complete uniforms for our workers, right down to their safety shoes.

We’re proud to be humble, and accept it as one of our Core Values.

Do You Need Junk Hauling Services?

If you’d like to see humble in action, call our office at 800-364-5778 to schedule a junk pickup in Northern Virginia, Maryland, or Washington, D.C. You’ll speak with a live person who will discover your needs, give you a flat rate price, and help you choose the ideal time for our truck to arrive. Contact 123JUNK today.

Now that summer is in full bloom, afternoons at the pool are a highlight of these hot and humid days. While swimming may be a fun activity, it can also be dangerous. That’s why we wanted to bring you a few pool safety tips, as recommended by the American Red Cross.

• Secure the pool or hot tub with appropriate barriers—a four-foot-high fence or barrier with a self-closing and self-latching gate.
• Supervise children constantly, and remain nearby while children are swimming. Never swim alone.
• Establish and enforce rules and teach safe poolside behaviors. Rules can include “no diving,” “stay away from drains,” and “walk, please.”
• Install a pool alarm that will alert you if someone enters the pool.
• Train everyone in how to swim. The American Red Cross offers courses. Also train household members in aquatic emergency response, water safety, first aid and CPR.
• Keep your pool clean and at proper chemical levels. Ensure proper water circulation.
• Place a safety cover over the pool or hot tub when you’re not using it. Remove ladders or steps.

We thought we’d add a few of our own pool area safety tips:

• Keep areas around pools clear of excess toys and yard debris like fallen branches, bush or tree trimmings or leaf piles. This prevents tripping hazards and helps keep the pool clean.
• Remove broken or outdated pool equipment. Instead of leaving the old motor or a set of broken pool stairs in the yard, have 123JUNK haul it away. If your items are not broken, and are reusable, we can donate them to an area charity for resale on your behalf.

123JUNK Can Haul Away Pools and Hot Tubs

If you have decided to replace your above-ground pool or hot tub, or just need one hauled away, 123JUNK can handle that. We can also clear your yard of debris: yard clippings, branches, leaves, trash from projects, furnishings, and even old swingsets and sheds. We’ll send our big red truck and professional staff around to make the pickup, leaving your yard tidy and ready for play.

Pool Safety Regulations

Every year thousands of people drown in swimming pools. According to the World Health Organization, drowning is the largest cause of unintentional death in the world and the leading cause of unintentional death for children ages one to four. Statistics claim that about 10 people die from drowning each day in the United States (The Centers for Disease Control) and that approximately 5,000 people yearly receive emergency care for injuries in pools or spas (U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.)

Pool safety is of such importance that the government has established regulations surrounding home pools. The “Swimming Pool Code” of 1968 created standards for the electrical equipment that is used around pools, like water circulators and heaters. In Virginia, Code of Virginia ordinances require fencing a minimum of four feet high around swimming pools, even those on private property.

Don’t let a pool disaster ruin your summer. Follow simple pool safety rules, and let 123JUNK help you keep a neat and tidy yard (and home).

Schedule your Pool or Hot Tub Pickup with 123JUNK

Call 123JUNK and talk with a live person to schedule your pickup. Whether it’s household goods, furniture, pools or hot tubs. We’ll take away almost anything.  Contact us today.

Your yard is an extension of your home; think of it as an outdoor room. And as you would put time and effort into cleaning and decorating your home, you should also put the same effort into making sure your outdoor living space is also appealing.  Here are some easy tips for a quick yard cleanup.

Deadhead Flowers

Flowers go through a cycle, and following their peak bloom, they fade, droop and die. This helps to create the seeds that will foster a future generation of flowers. To perform an instant pick-me-up on your flower garden, trim away the dead flowers and leaves. Using a small rake, pull away any debris that has fallen on the ground.

Trim Overgrown Bushes

In growing season, errant shoots can seemingly come out of nowhere on the shrubbery and bushes surround your foundation. Use a trimmer to easily reshape shrubbery and remove extra-long branches and shoots. Trim away any dead portions of the shrubs or bushes at the same time.

Edge Gardens and Walkways

Use a string trimmer to cut the tall grasses that just can’t be reached by the lawnmower. They are often found along walkways, garden edges, paths, trees and foundations. If you’re really ambitious, use an electric edger to give a crisp, clean edge to walkways.

Cut Dead Branches

Dead or broken branches on trees are both unsightly and dangerous. In a windstorm, or really at any time, these broken or dead branches can break away, dropping onto and harming anything or anyone that is beneath them. If you cannot reach dead branches yourself, hire a professional tree service.

Cut the Grass

Grass doesn’t seem to grow all at the same rate, leaving areas of tall and short throughout the lawn as it matures. But don’t think that if you cut it short, you won’t have to cut it as often. According to the DIY Network, “Grass that’s cut too short is more susceptible to weed invasion, drought and heat damage.” Set the lawnmower to about a 3” height and cut about every 5-7 days, depending on its growth rate.

Place Potted Plants

An instant way to create a lovely garden space is with large planters. Insert brightly colored and scented flowers, or create a kitchen herb garden. Since these plantings are in pots, they can be clustered in attractive settings or moved around to give a new look to your outdoor living space. Place potted flowers near entrances and on decks for an inviting and colorful transition from the outdoors to the indoors.

The Easiest Quick Yard Cleanup Tip of All: Call 123JUNK

Once you’ve chopped, lopped and dropped all your yard debris into one or more piles, it’s time to call 123JUNK. Our professional crews will come to your yard and haul away all that unsightly yard debris for you in one (or more) of our big red trucks. Just point us to the piles you want remove.

And while you’re at this yard cleanup, are there any structures that need to go? How about an old swingset, sandbox, hot tub or pool? We take that away also.

Your yard is going to be so beautiful that you won’t be able to stand to go back inside the house again. You’ll want to spend all your time admiring your yard.

We’re glad to help.

Contact 123JUNK to schedule your yard debris pickup today.

123JUNK was pleased to be asked to provide a guest blog for Middleburg Real Estate | Atoka Properties. When we talked about what we might contribute, we thought about why someone would use a junk removal company to help either sell or live in their homes and we came up with the idea that decluttering is probably the quickest and easiest way to really make your home shine. So we wrote the guest blog titled, “3 Simple Steps to Help Declutter Your Home.” Take a moment to visit our guest post.

What to Do With Excess Clutter

Essentially, when you are looking to sell a home, the first thing a Realtor or professional stager will tell you to do is declutter. Clear all surfaces and put away personal items. Get rid of or put into storage extraneous furnishings and decorations.

We all have too much stuff, and moving is an ideal time to winnow down the amount of stuff we own. But we hate to throw it away.

That’s where 123JUNK comes in. Instead of tossing your unwanted—but perfectly good and valuable—items into the trash, call us. We have the philosophy of repurposing household goods, furniture, clothing, and other items back into the community through the charitable organizations with whom we partner. They include organizations like Habitat for Humanity’s ReStore, A Wider Circle, and No One Left Behind. They take your unwanted items and put them up for sale in their retail stores and use the profits to fund their programs.

When you schedule a pickup with 123JUNK, we will document your donation and provide you with a receipt for your tax records. You will be clearing out your house, saving money on your taxes, and helping others in need all at the same time.

Of course, we do take junk too. We’ll haul away non-working electronics, piles of newspapers and magazines, outdoor items like swingsets, pools, sheds and hot tubs, and even yard debris and brush from your yard cleanout. You name it, we’ll haul it.

Contact 123JUNK

When you want to sell your home—or just want it to look beautiful with less clutter—contact 123JUNK. And be sure to read our guest post offering 3 simple tips to decluttering.

Did you know that July 21^st is National Junk Food Day?  We know it doesn’t necessarily relate to junk removal, but we get excited about any holiday that has the word “Junk” in it!

According to the National Day Calendar, July 21^st is “dedicated to the foods that everyone loves to snack on.” These foods are typically those high in sugar, salt and fat, with calories containing minimal nutritional value.

If you want to celebrate National Junk Food Day, post your favorite junk food, or snacks on social media with the hashtag #NationalJunkFoodDay.

Almost Half of our Trash is from Food and Food Packaging

Thinking further about National Junk Food Day, it actually does relate to junk removal. Did you also know that food and food packaging makes up about 45% of all the trash in U.S. landfills, said the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)? The National Resources Defense Council nonprofit reports that “less than 14% of plastic packaging is recycled and that single-use food and beverage packaging is one of the largest sources of the 269,000 tons of plastic pollution in the oceans. The recyclable materials that get thrown away in the U.S. every year are worth more than $11 billion.”

The next time you’re enjoying your junk food, think about whether you can recycle its packaging. Although certain packaging, like greasy potato chip bags and empty pizza boxes are not recyclable, much of the food packaging is, like aluminum, glass, plastic and paper.

123JUNK’s Donate—Recycle—Dispose Process

The U.S. unfortunately has one of the lowest rates of recycling among the developed nations. But we at 123JUNK are doing our bit to help improve that rate with our Donate—Recycle—Dispose three-step disposal process.

We’re not discouraging the eating of junk food. Hey, we love our junk food too. However, we do encourage everyone to think about recycling the packaging that comes along with our food. Set aside a bin for recyclables, and if you don’t have a recycling center nearby 123JUNK will be glad to make a pickup. We’ll deliver items we can repurpose, like furniture and household goods, to our charitable partners where they can be sold to fund the organizations, and we’ll sort out and take recyclable items to the area recycling center.

If we can do our bit to reduce the amount of trash in our landfills and oceans, we’ve had a good day. I guess it’s time to celebrate—with some junk food!

Contact 123JUNK

 Contact 123JUNK today to schedule your pickup.