FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT
Amy L. Loudenbeck, CHMM
Director
Business Material Exchange of Wisconsin
520 E. Grand Ave.
Beloit, WI 53511
Phone: 608-364-1131
Fax: 608-364-1161
E-Mail: bmex@ticon.net
Website: www.bmex.org
Beloit, WI – February 27, 2004 — The Business Material Exchange of Wisconsin (BMEx) assists companies, organizations and individuals that need materials by matching them with those that have reusable, surplus or by-product materials available. Those services will be expanded in the coming year to include the residential and community-wide business sector in the Greater Beloit area. The existing services will also be greatly enhanced and will be available to all Wisconsin users.
After the Greater Beloit Chamber of Commerce was awarded a grant from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources Solid Waste Reduction and Recycling Demonstration Grant Program of over $65,000 for the next 18 months, beginning Jan. 8, BMEx (a chamber program) has been able to start focusing on more than just increasing its number of postings and exchanges.
Nearly $15,000 of that grant is designated towards revamping the BMEx website, which BMEx Director Amy Loudenbeck anticipates will launch in May of 2004. Until the launch, the current site, www.bmex.org, will still be available for use.
The grant application highlighted ways to capitalize on the success, credibility and publicity of the present BMEx program and to utilize knowledge of how the program has evolved and where its strengths and weaknesses are to improve the level of service and the volume or tonnage of materials exchanged.
The revamped site will be more user-friendly, and a combination of two subsites. One will be the updated version of the current BMEx site for current users involved in more industrial-type businesses and/or ongoing waste generation. The new portion of the site, expected to be called ReMix, will be community-based. The website address will remain the same after the changes and will feature a gateway page where users can enter either of the two sub-sites.
In addition to expanding the type of users BMEx reaches, the nonprofit organization has other aims to maintain the grant’s expectations. One of the goals is to become self-sufficient and one way to do that is with out-of-area fees. Although BMEx serves primarily Wisconsin users, there are registered users in 40 states and 17 foreign countries. A second goal is to create a model for other communities. BMEx wants to showcase its web-based service as a low-budget program that could easily be set up and operated by other organizations such as a community’s department of solid waste.
BMEx presently offers a free Basic Membership, as well as an Extended Membership for a small annual fee. To find out more about how you can benefit from being a member of BMEx contact Amy Loudenbeck at 608-364-1131 or send email inquires to bmex@ticon.net.
