Why Shred?

Why Shred?... 

I have been racking my brain about the best topic to start me off on my new blogging adventure. After appropriately over thinking the whole matter, it hit me!

In my new sales role here at Five Star the biggest hurdle we come across is apathy. Why should you shred your documents? Heck, I will sometimes catch myself about to throw away a piece of paper, and I work at a Paper Shredding Company! Habit is to throw away your garbage, but believe it or not, it is important to move to a paper recycling program. 

Here are some top reasons why: 

1.    Identity Theft 

This is the easy one. We have all heard something on the hot topic of Identity Theft, and for good reason. Javelin Strategy Reported in February 2013, that the number of fraud incidents increased by 1 million more consumers over the past year and the dollar amount stolen increased to $21 billion. This equates to 1 incident of fraud every 3 seconds! 

A good place to start protecting yourself is by shredding your documents. I'm not just talking about big accounting firms either; even residents have documents stored that can contain compromising information. 

2.    Recycle- Go Green!

The first one is a gimmee, and makes you think about what you should be putting in a shred bin. But why take the time to sort what you should and shouldn't shred? Shred it all!! Everybody is getting on board the Go Green campaign, and your company should too. 

Recycling 1 ton of paper would:

*Save enough energy to power the average American home for 6 months.
*Save 7,000 gallons of water
*Save 3.3 cubic yards of landfill space
*Reduce greenhouse gas emissions by one metric ton of carbon equivalent (MTCE).

3.    It's the Law

There is more and more government involvement in information. This is putting a lot of burden on businesses to be compliant.  Not to mention, companies are spending millions of dollars trying to navigate through all these different regulations. But there is at least one easy step to make- implementing a secure shredding service.

Read more about some of the new legislation at the following sites:

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services 
Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act
How to Navigate New Health Information Security Regulations

4.    More Profit

Now that's what we are waiting to hear! Implementing a shredding service isn't just about doing right by mother earth, or protecting your clientele's information- It helps your pocket book! 

What's more economical? Paying your trusted employee to separate and remove paperclips and staples, and then paying them to stand over a paper shredder for hours? We can shred in minutes what would take your employee 8 hours to do by hand. Plus, we can shred through three ring binders, phone books, CDs, hard drives, media tapes, and etc...