Zero Waste Valet

Randi’s background is in sports management and leadership. Having been a gymnast nearly 13 years, she found her way into coaching during her undergraduate studies at the University of Texas at Austin. While working with kids, she began to think more about the future that was in store for herself and her athletes – and given the impact of climate change, the future seemed bleak. After 9 years managing operations and facility expansion at a local gym in Austin, she shifted into small business consulting focused on helping business owners scale their operations. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, she took the opportunity to attend graduate school at Colorado State University’s Impact MBA program where she discovered a passion for waste diversion and education. Her newfound passion led her to working at and managing Scraps’ event program where she honed her skills in waste diversion communication. She has helped hundreds of event attendees and organizers understand the importance of proper composting and recycling for both the climate and local ecosystem. In the spring of 2024, she took the lead as director of Scraps’ newest endeavor, Denver International Airport’s Zero Waste Valet project. Here, she combines her small business acumen and entrepreneurial background with her knowledge of behavior change and waste diversion. When she’s not at Scraps, she practices yoga and hangs out with her cat, Odie.

Austin has spent most of the past 10 years lending his creative charisma to some of the biggest and smallest tech companies in the world.  He most recently started working for himself as a business and consumer technology consultant before branching into the incredible world of compost.  Both an avid cyclist and outdoor adventurer he was drawn to Colorado for it’s world-class nature and weather as well as it’s reputation of having one of the most vibrant environmental sustainability cultures in the country.  Having adopted the Leave-No-Trace philosophy at a young age and remaining  passionate about it ever since, he enjoys having the opportunity to minimize the ecological impact of events by diverting compostable materials away from landfills and waterways while working as Scraps’ Event Specialist. As one of the first people hired to pioneer Denver International Airport’s Zero-Waste Valet project his many talents and technical expertise have helped expand the operational spectrum of the small team’s capabilities and continually prove invaluable in laying the ground roots for a zero-waste future.

Christi is founder and CEO of Scraps. Before ever imagining starting a small business, Christi spent seven years in Madagascar partnering with communities to create appropriate solutions to local sustainability challenges; then, in a pivot from international development she came to Colorado to pursue a masters in environmental journalism and connect with sustainability & climate issues through a different lens. Not satisfied with a communications and journalism career, and frustrated with the lack of action on what seemed like a solvable problem, Christi launched Scraps in 2017 as a means to pilot a simple, bike-based compost pickup service to Denver’s underserved downtown community. In the seven years since, Scraps has grown to serve nearly 5000 commercial & residential members throughout the Denver Metro, diverted more than 5 million pounds of material, and become one of the most recognized organics haulers on Colorado’s Front Range. Scraps remains devoted to increasing access to composting, raising awareness of its benefits and helping make composting the norm in Colorado. Christi lives on a small homestead in Arvada, CO with two dogs and 30+ rescue animals. If she’s not talking trash, she’s probably hiking, rafting, cooking for friends or running around with her goats.

Growing up in rural Kansas, Sydney found a passion for agriculture and soil health at a young age and has continued to feed those interests throughout her life. While working as a sustainability intern on a college campus, she saw how beneficial compost is not only as an amendment to soil, but also as a solution to waste management and the overall health of the environment. She is dedicated to reducing the amount of food scraps that go to the landfill and to be a part of Denver’s sustainable food management system.

In July 2024, Sydney stepped into Scraps’ newest program, the  Zero Waste Valet project in partnership with Denver International Airport. Here, she helps manage the waste streams from the food & beverage concessions on the B concourse (where the project is focused), including creating training programs, tracking diversion data, & constantly iterating on this groundbreaking approach to waste diversion in a highly complex environment.

In her downtime, Sydney enjoys hanging out with her labradoodle pups, traveling to new places & simply enjoying the sunshine.

Leah is a Colorado State University Alumni, having studied Agricultural Biology. She is an experienced informal educator, having worked in fields such as gardening, invertebrates, aquariums, and Colorado wildlife. Her passion is utilizing environmental topics as a means to connect and uplift communities. With that said, this girl loves compost; she is passionate about food systems from garden planning to increasing food accessibility to composting food scraps. She is excited to be getting her hands dirty as a Zero Waste Valet Associate for Denver International Airport’s Zero Waste Valet project.