Knee deep in garbage in her company's dumpster and tearing through trash bags, Bonnie Brooks had something of an epiphany.

She realized that more than 90 per cent of what was thrown away could be diverted from a landfill, mostly to recycling. She knew then she was on the right path -- even if it did start with a day of dumpster diving.

"It was unreal. We were driven by wanting to improve what we do and that's when you start looking at what you can do better," said Brooks, environmental and management systems co-ordinator at Keiper Automotive in London.

"This is about reducing our footprint and about saving money."

It all started about a year ago when customers began demanding to know what the automotive parts maker was doing to reduce its waste.

The customers were demanding the company meet industrial standards -- called ISO 14001 -- and if it didn't, Keiper may not make the list of bidders for jobs.

"That got out attention right away," she laughed.

The first step was to do a waste audit -- that is, find out what they are throwing away. That led Brooks to the dumpster.

"I had to get in there and tear apart the bags. That was the only way to find out what we were really doing," she said. "I didn't mind it so much, although a lot of people here at work laughed at me."

Although Keiper began looking seriously at the problems last fall, it has been aggressively working to reduce waste for about six months and the turnaround has been remarkable, Brooks says.

The three massive industrial garbage bins on its property have been reduced to one, the company has contracted a recycler who is taking wood and plastic that used to go straight to a landfill and the business is also recycling more paper and cardboard than ever before.

A year ago Keiper sent 22 tonnes of waste to a landfill a month. Now it is down to 18 tonnes a month, and since industries pay for waste to be hauled away, it's a savings of about $12,000 a year.

"I found out we were not recycling wood and plastic -- they were going to a landfill," Brooks said. "Our goal here is to send nothing to a landfill, but we have to change attitudes and awareness. Some people still don't care."

After much searching Keiper found a company, Oxford Pallet and Recyclers in Norwich, that would take the wood and plastic.

That immediately reduced a large chunk of garbage. Keiper was also aggressively pursuing other recycling efforts, such as throwing away less cardboard.

"That (finding a recycler) was huge, just huge," she said. "That is where we made our biggest savings."

Oxford rebuilds the palettes that used to go to the bins and resells them and sells its plastic to a Niagara region firm for recycling, said Henk Vrugteveen, the owner and president.

"Every pallet we put through the door here is a saved tree," he said.

"We deal with a lot of manufacturers -- every time you see a truck on the highway it is carrying palettes."

Sales have grown about 25 per cent a year at the Norwich business. About five months ago it moved into a new, $1-million plant to accommodate that growth, he said.