Wirefly-FlipSwap Recycling Program A Huge Boon To The Environment, Charitable Giving

These days, innovation rules the cell phone industry. With new and exciting products hitting the market so regularly, more and more customers are upgrading at the earliest possible date. There’s one obvious result of embracing the best and brightest new cell phones – we all wind up with a stable of old phones that have outlived their usefulness. What, exactly, are we supposed to do with these mementos from the early 21st century?

For starters, an unwanted cell phone should not be tossed out with the garbage. For environmental reasons, it’s best to avoid sending your phone to the landfill; like most electronic devices, cell phones often produce toxic materials once they leak or degrade. That leaves two potential solutions – either collect old phones in a dusty drawer for posterity, or, preferably, find a way to recycle them.

Last fall, Wirefly launched its own cell phone recycling initiative in tandem with an industry leader, FlipSwap. Through the website we set up at Wirefly.org, we’ve been able to help thousands of Wirefly customers recycle old cell phones, all while donating to their favorite charity or pocketing a little extra cash.

Recycle Your Cell Phone At Wirefly.org

How does it work? Our partnership with FlipSwap makes it very simple. If you have an old phone you’d like to recycle, Wirefly.org will walk you through the process and explain your options. Once you’ve identified your cell phone model, FlipSwap’s custom interface at CellPhoneTradeIns.com will provide a quote for your phone, a printable, prepaid shipping label and receipt. Simply slip your old phone into an envelope or small box and drop it in the mail.

Your phone will either be redistributed to someone in need, refurbished and resold, or simply sent to a processing center for proper, safe disposal. In turn, you’ll receive a sum of money based on the utility of your specific cell phone model. Some phone models can yield as much as $200. In addition, our joint effort with FlipSwap allows you to donate that cash to a charity of your choice – the list includes the American Red Cross, the Sierra Club, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, and many more.

FlipSwap’s CEO, Sohrob Farudi, explains the value his company brings to the industry: “We partnered with Wirefly to establish CellPhoneTradeIns.com in order to streamline the cell phone recycling process.  With just three easy steps, your phone will be on its way to a recycling facility or redistribution center, and a check sent  to you or your favorite charity.”  Farudi continues: “The amount of money out there for people willing to recycle cell phones is surprising, and we’re working to distribute that cash, help protect the environment, and assist some charities along the way. It’s win-win-win.”

For more information about this Wirefly.org initiative and to see the full list of charities Wirefly supports, along with environmental reasons to recycle old cell phones, visit www.wirefly.org.

Wirefly does not handle the collection and recycling of the used cell phones and does not buy back used cell phones for the purpose of resale in any way.

About Wirefly

Wirefly (www.wirefly.com) is the online leader in one-stop comparison shopping for cell phones, wireless service plans and wireless accessories. Wirefly is an authorized dealer for every major cellular carrier in the U.S. Wirefly also offers discounts and services not available in retail wireless stores, including real-time online order status and tracking, and the guaranteed lowest price – online or anywhere else -- on cell phone devices from Motorola, Nokia, Samsung, LG, BlackBerry and many other cell phone handset manufacturers. Wirefly.com has been named Best of the Web by Forbes magazine as the “best all-around number portability portal” and “Best in Overall Customer Experience” by Keynote Performance Systems. For more information on Wirefly, its wireless products and its services, visit www.wirefly.com.

About Flipswap

Started in 2005, Flipswap has quickly become the leader in innovative trade-in and recycling solutions for the wireless industry. Flipswap makes it easy to give old phones a second shot at life by offering fast, free and eco-friendly ways to trade them in. The average American buys a new cell phone every 12 months, which means more than one hundred million perfectly good phones become unused, unwanted, and unloved every year. To help maximize the useful life of each phone, Flipswap created a unique way of collecting them so they could be put back into use. Now instead of being thrown in a drawer or in the trash, cell phones can be traded in for instant store credit at one of over 4,000 participating Flipswap retail locations, or traded-in online at websites like Wirefly.com. So whether you have a few old phones in a drawer at home or a warehouse full of them, Flipswap’s family of services will pay you to be one of the good guys. It has never been this easy to be green! For more information, please visit Flipswap on the web at www.flipswap.com.