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Health & Fitness

Company Reinvents Idea of Who a CEO Should Be

AMESBURY, Mass. — Men have historically run the recycling business, but with one woman’s  ascension to president of a cutting-edge recycler, one more glass ceiling has been shattered, allowing the woman’s unique experience, education and perspective to enhance the way the company operates. 

Julie Wiggin is the CEO, and retains her position as CFO, of Metalwave, Inc. The company was launched in 2010 to provide customers with a more transparent and cost-effective alternative to the traditionally shady world of e-waste “down streaming.” From its 25,000-square-foot facility in Amesbury, Mass., Metalwave recycles PCs, printers, CRT computer monitors, televisions, hard drives, cell phones, and other outdated, discarded electronic equipment.  

MetalWave ships the separated materials to a selected group of vetted partners — all of whom are experts in material shredding and non-ferrous extraction. They follow strict guidelines to ensure the e-waste that they handle is properly disassembled, shredded, and processed by reputable domestic vendors who do not take shortcuts, cut corners, or export their waste to other countries, creating jobs in the United States while ensuring sustainability in the process. 

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Julie Wiggin and her husband, Brad, have been involved with Metalwave since the couple bought out the other two owners in May 2011. Before becoming Metalwave’s president, Wiggin had been intimately involved in the company’s financial aspects.  

“So I don’t know that Metalwave has changed or that I’ve brought to it anything different,” Wiggin said in a recent telephone interview, “but as we’ve grown, our vision is clearer as to who we are, our identification as a company.” 

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Clarity comes, she said, from communication. 

“My goal is for us to understand each other better,” she said. “I would say that’s the biggest difference in perspective with me becoming head of the company: I’m leading meetings in a more substantial manner than I was before. So communication is there, and it’s more important to me than it would have been to someone in the past. One would leave with a clearer directive than before.” 

Emphasizing communication comes naturally to Wiggin: She has a background in counseling, having earned a master’s degree in the profession from the University of New Hampshire and continuing education credits in spiritual direction and healing arts, to go along with a business degree from Providence College. 

“Your goal is to understand each other better,” she said both about counseling and running Metalwave. “A meeting is run on what the message truly is — not a reactive message — so that communication is clear.” 

Changing, too, are the business opportunities for what is now a woman-run company. Metalwave has submitted applications to the state of New Hampshire, the state of Massachusetts and to the federal government to be certified as suppliers to certain large companies, and to colleges and universities, who gain credit for working with female-run companies.  

Metalwave Director of Development Peter McCue works closest with Wiggin on the woman-run aspect of the business.  “Julie is really great to work with,” he said. “She’s a real quick study. We’ve been working very closely on certifications for women-owned businesses, and she’s just a very hard worker and really understands the business very well.” 

Metalwave is a business partner of the Green Alliance, a union of local sustainable businesses promoting environmentally sound business practices and a green co-op offering discounted green products and services to its members. Green Alliance Green Card holders get a discount of up to 50 percent off recycling charges on electronics, including monitors, printers, faxes, copiers, and televisions, as well as free battery recycling. They also save $28.50 off a consumer recycling load of 10 batteries, two monitors, one printer, and one television. 

In partnership with MetalWave, the Green Alliance offers a free electronic waste recycling center for its members at its downtown Portsmouth office, 75 Congress St., Suite 304. 

But as much as being a woman-run company has expanded Metalwave’s business opportunities, the company’s core remains the same, a testament to the strength of its business model.  

Immutable, Wiggin said, “is the idea that companies want to be secure about where their products go, that they can be assured that their product is not going on a container to China, and that when their product is released there is a chain of custody and somebody takes responsibility for what their products become. The commodities that the products become, the auditability downstream of what those products become, I would say that it hasn’t changed much, only that it has become crisper and cleaner and more defined.”  

Still, the irony of running a recycling company is not lost on Wiggin: “It’s sort of funny because though you think of recycling as this association with Mother Earth, it’s still s a male-dominated industry.” 

But change is in the winds.  

For more information about Metalwave, visit www.metalwaveinc.co. And for the Green Alliance, visit www.greenalliance.biz.
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