Venterra Realty, Villa Lago Apartments, and Villa Lago Community Manager, Nicol Brown were recently honored to receive a North Texas Recycling Award! The annual awards presented by The STAR North Texas and North Texas Corporate Recycling Associations recognize the outstanding contributions of individuals, communities, and businesses for developing or maintaining programs involving recycling and other sustainability efforts in North Texas.
Nicol shares the story that was nine years in the making below!
“While working at a property in Coppell, TX in 2006, Mark Fief, the owner/operator of a local trash/recycling service, convinced me to add his recycling program to his trash pick-up service already in place. I had an uphill battle convincing owners and investors of the value of the monthly expense until the program rolled out 100%, but the residents were very interested in the ongoing green movement and in conservation. As a result, we created a leasing and resident retention campaign that provided residents with a number of environmentally friendly items and amenities. One of these was a recycling program. I went on to convince the company to implement the program at another community and then again while working at a different company.
I reentered the multi-family industry at Villa Lago this year and what do you know… Mark and his recycling program was already in place there and at several Venterra communities in the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex!
For the efforts that we had made towards encouraging apartment community recycling, Mark nominated Venterra Realty, Villa Lago Apartments, and me for the award, and we won! It made me very proud to have contributed and to be part of a company that has already jumped on board with the program!”
Big congrats to Nicol and Villa Lago for going green in a big way!