Ryan Hickman was only three years old when he developed a love for recycling. From that young age until he was 12, his love developed and turned into a passion. When Ryan heard that he could make money by bringing recyclables to a plant, he decided to bring his own things and collect recyclables from people in his neighborhood. Not long after he started collecting from others, he began getting requests from more and more people in his community to take their recycling to the plant, and Ryan was making incredible sums of money. Soon after, Ryan’s dad helped him turn his hobby into a full-blown operating business, “Ryan’s Recycling.” The trash Ryan was once able to collect using his bike, he had to do in a car, and even expanded outside his neighborhood. As of now, Ryan’s business had collected over 1.6 million cans and bottles, which was truly an incredible feat and a powerful statistic when considering the environmental impact. Ryan is an incredible entrepreneur, and I love that his parents helped him turn his seemingly silly passion into a business and job.

To top that all off, Ryan didn’t stop there and was able to start an additional business called Project 3R, which is a non-profit solely built upon donations. It is all focused on raising awareness for the environment and the need to recycle and Ryan has been incredibly success with it. He is truly incredible and continues to make a positive impact on the world and environment every day, on bottle and can at a time.