San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
WHERE JUNK IS KING
Skyline: Growing junk removal business picks up, recycles and donates treasures in trash.
Junk King’s warehouse near San Antonio International Airport is crowded with salvaged goods — random treasures plucked from offices and homes across the city.
There’s a “Casablanca” movie poster, white peacock chair, foosball table, box of Pyrex containers, a gold bicycle, and glass Sprite bottle with a label touting the Spurs’ 2003 championship. Yellowed letters between military personnel and their families and a mortgage note from 1897 for $200 a month are kept in a desk salvaged from a job.
“It’s amazing what people don’t want any more,” said DeWitt Rote, who owns the Junk King franchise at 10415 Perrin Beitel Road with his wife, Shelly.
Theirs is a junk-removal business, not a junk store. Unless there’s a designated sale, customers can’t just come in to buy stuff.
Leather couches sit near suitcases. There are VCRs, mason jars, vases, truck tires, a pet carrier, lampshades and chests of drawers. Paintings of Disney princesses, delicate teacups with gold plating and a butter churn rest near Wii consoles, an old cash register and curtains still in clear plastic packaging.
Some of the items won’t be there long. As much as 60 percent of the “junk” employees
pick up from homes and offices is recycled, reused or repurposed to keep it from ending up in a landfill.
Suitcases go to Roy Maas Youth Alternatives, which provides support and shelter for children and young adults in crisis. Books are given to libraries, pet supplies to the Animal Defense League and aging electronics to the San Antonio Museum of Science and Technology.
Furniture is set aside for Habitat for Humanity of San Antonio, Goodwill San Antonio and Salvation Army of San Antonio. Wheelchairs and walkers are reused by Project MEND, which provides medical equipment to people with disabilities. Concrete, scrap metal and wood are
hauled off to recycling facilities.
Junk King’s own office is furnished with items left behind by homeowners and businesses: desks, chairs, a refrigerator, a map of San Antonio and posters of Batman and Robin, and the Beatles’ “Abbey Road” album.
The business periodically opens its warehouses to the public for garage sales, too.
“It’s like Christmas,” Shelly said.
The couple are fairly new to the junk-removal industry. Several years ago, DeWitt, an accountant, was getting tired of deadlines and started searching for a new career. He and his wife, a special education teacher who still substitutes, considered several different businesses —
including restaurants, liquor stores and a FedEx Ground route — before buying their Junk King franchise in 2017.
Transitioning to a new field was a challenge. They had to learn where to take surplus items, how to manage employees and how to handle customers — but they say it’s been a welcome change.
“It’s something different every day,” DeWitt said.
About 85 percent of Junk King’s jobs are residential, with calls coming from people seeking to have a deceased relative’s home emptied, to clean out their own homes or help a friend who’s hoarding items.
The rest of the jobs are commercial and have included businesses scaling back office space or closing during the coronavirus pandemic.
Junk King employees have picked up an assortment of quirky items, including a family movie reel, wool clothes from the 1950s, ivory tusks, a photo signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson and Chinese artifacts.
“You get a glimpse into people’s lives,” Shelly said.
Pricing for junk removal usually begins at $99, and each truck can hold about 18 cubic yards of stuff, DeWitt said. Junk King’s 19 employees are equipped with zip-up suits with masks. In addition to revenue from fees to pick up and haul away items from homes and businesses, some materials are sold.
Business slowed in March due to the pandemic and remained flat in April, but it’s accelerated since then, the couple said.
They have added a second Junk King location near Bandera Road in Northwest San Antonio, a fast-growing slice of the city, and plan to have three trucks at each warehouse. Opening a location there will enable them to drop off items for sorting and quickly move on to the next job.
If workers ask to keep items, 99 percent of the time the answer is yes, DeWitt said. The couple have also held onto some discoveries themselves, such as glittery Snoopy Christmas decorations, a desk for their son’s remote classes and screen doors they want to use for a greenhouse.
“It’s like looking at treasures,” Shelly said.