Yes. We collect food scraps and the paper that touched food, and nothing else. Your trash and your recycling stay with whoever handles them now.

It depends on what kind of business you are and how big. New York City rules currently cover restaurants, delis, coffee shops and cafeterias at 7,000 square feet or more, chains with two or more city locations totaling 8,000 square feet, food service in hotels with at least 100 guest rooms, supermarkets and grocery chains above certain sizes, catering establishments hosting events over 100 people, temporary public events over 500 people, arenas and stadiums seating 15,000 or more, and large food manufacturers and wholesalers. State law separately requires large food scrap generators to donate edible food and recycle the rest.

That list is widening. The City Council passed a bill this year that lets the Sanitation Department extend the requirement to a much broader set of food businesses, including venues and wholesalers, with a capacity decision due December 1, 2026. If you are near any of those lines, it is worth checking directly with DSNY.

Plenty of our customers are under every threshold and do this anyway, because they want to run an environmentally responsible business, building, office or event.

The longer answer, with every threshold.

No. Our report says what we collected, when, what it weighed, how much compost it made, and where that compost went in the city. Your obligations as a commercial waste generator are yours to meet.

$25.00 per bucket collected, with a minimum per pickup of $75.00 in Brooklyn and $100.00 in Manhattan that covers sending the van. New York sales tax at 8.875% is added. Full rate card on the pricing page.

No. No contract, no subscription, no monthly minimum, no deposit, and nothing charged at signup. Your card runs, or you are invoiced, for the buckets actually collected.

You can still use us. Waste collected by a micro-hauler is excluded from the Commercial Waste Zones program, so our service sits alongside your zone carter rather than competing with them. Your trash and recycling go to your zone carter; your food scraps come to us.

Yes. We run weekend service, which is how most venues and weekend markets get collected. Tell us the day that suits you when you check your address and we will fit it to the route.

A lidded 5-gallon bucket, about 25 lbs when full. Most cafes run 4 to 6 a week, full-service restaurants 8 to 16, a grocery or commissary more, a single office pantry a few. Tell us your covers or your headcount and we will suggest a number. After that the scale corrects it, and you can change the count until 5pm the day before any pickup.

Yes, with compostable liners, and they stay our property on loan to you. No deposit and nothing charged at signup. A bucket not returned when service ends, or returned damaged beyond use, is billed at $10.00.

The lid is the answer. Buckets stay closed between scrapings, they get swapped for clean ones every service day, and you never wash one. It is also why we suggest bi-weekly rather than monthly above about 4 buckets: four weeks of that much food in a bucket can attract pests. You can still have monthly at any count if it suits you.

The site composts by the batch, and a batch is everything that came in over a few weeks from every stop. Plastic does not break down, it breaks up, and compost with plastic fragments in it cannot go to a garden. So the first two times we photograph it, collect it anyway, and email you what we found. Persistent contamination ends service. Here is the full list of what goes in the bucket, on one page, printable for the wall.

Yes, until 5pm the day before, from your account, with no call and no charge. Nothing is billed until a pickup happens.

If the buckets are not lidded and at the spot on file when the earth steward arrives, that day carries a $75.00 surcharge. The first incident at any address is always waived. Every incident is recorded with a photo and arrival and departure timestamps, a person reviews it before anything is charged, and you can see all of it in your account. It does not apply when the fault is ours, or when a building closure, security directive or emergency keeps us out.

Our community compost site in South Brooklyn. It becomes compost that goes back out to community and school gardens, street tree beds and parks in the city. Nothing is landfilled, incinerated, or trucked out of the city. Our compost page lists every delivery with the businesses whose scraps were in it.

Yes, as a separate service with its own quote. See Events and venues.

Give us the address anyway. If your block is forming, you can sign up with no card and nothing charged. A block opens once the businesses on it add up to 8 buckets a pickup, which is the load that makes the trip worth running. If we are not in your neighborhood at all, the address goes on the waitlist and we will keep you updated when there is enough demand in your neighborhood to start service.

516-633-2021, or email hello@nycscraps.com.