This summer has been a busy one for us here at Maxi Container, Inc. Our Rain Barrels, which started as a tiny side-project for us, have turned into an entire Home & Garden product line. This line now includes Rain Barrels, Compost Tumblers, Compost Tea Kits and our newest product…(drum roll please) container gardening! We are currently testing out various container gardening designs for our pails and barrels. Expect to see them soon on our website. You may have already seen some of our container gardening items at one of the many Green Events we have been at this year.  If you haven’t already please check out our Flickr “Container Gardening” photo set here.

At Maxi, our passion does not end with our workday. We have a love for being involved in our community. To that end, we work with schools, churches and other non-profits such as the Sierra Club Great Lakes Program to help spread the word about water conservation, composting and reuse.

From rain barrels to rain gardens, from composting basics to compost tea, we are involved in every step of our products design and manufacture. (Technically speaking, its re-manufacture, since our Home & Garden products are made from used food grade containers). Nothing goes unnoticed and if anyone has a question or complaint (no matter how small), we make sure to take care of it. That’s what you get when you choose MAXI.

Now, with that all being said, as one of my favorite frogs once said, “It ain’t easy being GREEN.” Our Home & Garden line has turned into a full-time job. Our Twitter is full of eco-friendly tweeters and gardeners. Sometimes we participate in green fairs and community events two to three weekends in a row. When you add in the time it takes to get ready for these events, you can see how hard we are working to promote our core concepts of sustainability, reuse and conservation. Why do we do it? Just take a look at this past month of July…

We arranged to be involved in three different events one weekend and had another event the next weekend. Within nine days, we had four events. If you asked me last year at this time if we would be at that many events, I would of simply answered “not possible”. Now my attitude is different and the sky is the limit.

The first event was the Ferndale Live Green Fair. While in its second year, it is still in its infancy. Last year the Live Green Fair was part of the Funky Ferndale Art Fair and it had only eight or so vendors. However, it was a great success. This year it became a standalone with over 80 GREEN vendors. The event was beautiful, with fun for all ages. The only downside was the heat. This past July turned out to be one of the hottest on record for metro Detroit, and the Live Green Fair happened to be smack dab in the middle of one of our biggest heat waves. I applaud any of the people who made it out to the Ferndale Live Green Fair. We thank you for braving the high temperatures! This green fair is by far the truest green event (the creators are extremely green guys!) and it has a lot of potential. Let’s just hope that next year there is better weather!

Our second event was the Lavender Festival in Armada, MI, hosted at Blake’s Cider Mill. Though not a “Green” fair per say, the event had many green vendors, organics for your garden, artwork made from reused materials and of course, lots and lots of lavender! There was also an education tent that had a workshop every hour. I taught a workshop on Friday that was very successful and had a great time interacting with interested gardeners. We had a great time here and hope to come back again! Thank you to Jennifer Vasich, who created the event and who asked us to be a part of it for the first time.

Our third event of the weekend was part of Farmington’s Founders Festival. We had a very successful workshop with the Salem United Church of Christ in Downtown Farmington. Read the full article here.

The next weekend, we took part in Birmingham’s Green Breeze on the streets of Old Woodward. Richard Rubin (my father) and I set out to see what all of the local Birmingham residents were up to. The turnout for this event hasn’t been as great as we would like, but the people we meet at it seem to be committed to the same values as we are at Maxi.  I had some great conversations, met some really exciting and cool new people, and sold a few rain barrels. We also saw many familiar faces. Overall, it was a good weekend and a relaxing final show for our busy two weeks.

Why have I gone into such great detail to illustrate what we did this summer? Some of you may ask why do these Industrial Packaging guys give up their hard-earned weekends? We do it because here at Maxi we believe in our community and in empowering people through education about reuse and sustainability. Stop and think about it. If more businesses operated like Maxi, wouldn’t the world be a better place? The bottom-line is not always about making a dollar. Sometimes it’s just simply about making an impact.

Hope to see you at one of our upcoming green events… check our Facebook or Follow us on Twitter for up to date news on where we will be!