Businesses smile at resource exchange

The founding philosophy of the Smile Resource Exchange is “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure”.

The Saving Money through Industry Links and Exchanges initiative is a free service that encourages businesses to share resources to each other’s benefit.

An example of a working partnership — or synergy, as Smile refers to them — is that of Agility Logistics, a freight firm, and a local packaging company. Agility Logistics had a huge amount of waste styrofoam that was costly to dispose of.

Through Smile, the styrofoam was sent to a packaging company, which reused it.

Agility saved on disposal costs, while the packaging company received a raw material for free.

Michelle Green, project manager with Smile, said that at any event, they can identify up to 200 exchanges between companies.

“At our most recent event in Limerick, 160 potential exchanges were identified among over 50 businesses in attendance; and now we’re really looking forward to progressing even further in Cork, where it all started off,” she said.

Since its inception, Smile Resource Exchange, which now has almost 500 members, has identified over 1,000 potential matches between businesses, as well as identifying thousands of euros of cost savings for them.

The initiative began in Cork in 2010. Since then it has expanded into Kerry, Limerick and Clare.

Relationships between companies are established at free networking events. The next event will take place on Mar 1, in the Castlemartyr Resort, Co Cork.

As places are limited, registration is essential for event, which runs from 8.45am to 1pm followed by lunch.

To register, log onto www.smileexchange.ie.