Mason McNeill - Rerouting America's Food Waste, One Grocery Store at a Time

[00:00:10] Christy: Welcome to Green Champions.

[00:00:11] Dominique: Thanks for joining us in a conversation with real people sharing sustainability success stories.

[00:00:16] Christy: This podcast is a platform for green champions to share their stories and plant new ideas. I'm Christy.

[00:00:21] Dominique: And I'm Dominique.

[00:00:22] Christy: Today, we're back with Mason McNeill. He's the Chief Commercial Officer at Denali. And we're discussing how investment decisions play a role in scaling solutions in the organics recycling space. If you didn't hear, you should check out his first episode, that was last week.

It's really interesting to hear about his personal story. But now we're gonna dig in on some of the impact of Mason's career. Our last conversation, we were just kind of talking about Denali a little bit because that's where you are now. And so I'm curious maybe if you want to give us some intro to who Denali is and what in the world does a chief commercial officer do there, 

[00:01:02] Mason: All right. Well, thanks for having me, Christy and Dominique. So I'll start with what Denali does or who we are. So we are the nation's largest organics recycler. What are organics, right? So that to us that means, all variety of waste and residual streams coming off of really, our core infrastructure, from food waste to greenways, to food processing residuals and other streams that at the end of the day are organic in nature and that can be repurposed into valuable products that have a use case somewhere else in our system.

And so we focus on working with generators of material that needs to be repurposed and designing programs to collect and transport their material to a variety of facilities or other types of uses that ultimately see that that material repurposed into animal feed, fertilizer, compost or renewable energy. So that is a nutshell, is Denali. We're a nationwide company. So one of the things that I really like about our business is we've got, you know, really a team that's working all over the country from California to New York, to Florida, to Texas.

So we're really spread out. And because this is a widespread industry and a widespread set of challenges that we're helping our customers address. And then your second question was, what does a chief commercial officer do?

So, I'm part of our executive team, and I report to our CEO, Todd Mathis. And I am responsible for our customer relationships and sales efforts as well as our infrastructure growth, which what does that mean? It's the acquisition and development of facilities out in the out in the country that allow us to bring that vision to life of repurposing material. So, it's a really exciting part of the business to get that I get to lead. I couldn't do it without a really fantastic team. and every day I'm thankful of getting to come into work and work on all the exciting things we do here so.

[00:03:05] Dominique: Where do you primarily do that work? Is that where Denali gets started? So where's home for you and where's home for Denali?

[00:03:10] Mason: Yeah. Well, at the end of the day, Denali is, you know, we get this question a lot, you know, where are you based? Where's the headquarters? I, I often make folks understand that, you know, our work is really out in the field, out in the country. We've got folks that are running routes. You know, really in all of the lower 48, we've got facilities in dozens of states. So the real work happens out in the field. And to me, that's where the action happens. We've got a couple of corporate offices, let's say. We've got offices in North Texas and in Arkansas. So I'm based here in northwest Arkansas. That's where I live and hang my hat. We have a, you know, an office here, so.

[00:03:42] Christy: I think it could be interesting. 

I'd like to dig in on this idea about Denali as the largest organics recycler in the US. I think to get to that and understand that maybe it would be helpful if you could give us an overview of what's the kind of current state of organics recycling, and then how has that influenced your work, your vision in this strategically to become that largest organics recycler?

[00:04:12] Mason: Yeah, I mean, we could go into a lot of detail on that. I think what I would tell you is, the state of play for me is within the organics recycling is not new. This is something that's been happening for a long time, within the broader context of the waste and recycling industry. So organics recycling is not new, but there's a lot of new activity taking place in the space looking at how much organic material is still going into landfills across the country. And thinking about all of the new infrastructure, the new solutions needed to effectuate a shift away from the landfill and reduce what's going into that part of the system. So that's, I think the state of play. 

[00:04:53] Christy: I think it is complex, the organics, where we are currently. And I think what I'm trying to drill in is a little bit of how that's influenced Denali strategically. 

[00:05:03] Mason: Like I said, the organics recycling space is not new. And so much of our legacy goes back many decades and into serving particularly parts of the food processing space where, we were doing circularity solutions for customers really be before that's sort of become in vogue. It was something that was really a common sense way to handle something that was a byproduct of food production. And so, with that legacy, what we've learned is that there's an excellence that you must pursue with customer service and how you manage your fleet and your facilities and your employees and safety.

And so that's how we think about as there's more activity in things like food waste diversion. We have this legacy doing things that have been around for a long time that informs the way that we conduct ourselves and, you know, in that space so. 

[00:05:49] Dominique: And Mason, I wanna shift a little bit to your role within Denali, and kind of the aspect of this work that you've been championing specifically. And your role is focusing on responding to customer needs. Correct? 

[00:06:01] Mason: Correct. At the end of the day, yes, we exist to service our customers. Absolutely.

[00:06:06] Dominique: And I really wanna hear maybe some like standout takeaways. Like what have you been hearing from customers, just kind of across the board, what are some common conversations you feel like you have most often?

[00:06:16] Mason: I think that there's great intrigue in circularity were at large, creating ways to take something that is a residual or a waste from core business activities and find a way to repurpose that material into, you know, in a use case for that customer.

So that's absolutely a topic. And one of the things that we've leaned into to deliver on that is to create a sustainable compost product that we make with composted food waste that's generated from different retailers and recirculate that back, you know, onto their shelves.

[00:06:50] Dominique: So it sounds like your customers are on both sides. Your customers are the folks who are needing material collected and wondering how to even begin doing that or how they can get it in a way that suits their business operation. And then you also have the customers that are receiving your soil.

[00:07:05] Mason: Correct. And, you know, and that goes to other applications as well, like animal feed and renewable fuels. And so to create a circular story, you've gotta have, to your point, have two customers. And it's really critical to make the business to deliver on our ability to recycle that product. We have customers of dairy farmers and row croppers and folks across the agricultural space that take our repurposed products, as well as buyers of renewable fuels.

So it's a very important part of our business is striking that important balance towards two ends of the circular link.

[00:07:40] Dominique: You are really that like very vital connection between the interest, let's just say, in having organic material get where it needs to go. But you coordinate all of that and you manage not only the transport, but the logistics and the relationship building, which feels very notable. And especially thinking about your role where you're hearing needs, you're really helping to craft so that is well oiled.

[00:08:02] Mason: Correct. I think that understanding our customer's goals at the end of the day is how we make business decisions about how we develop our infrastructure, develop our capabilities, and often that's no small feat. You're talking about a lot of investment into rolling stock or on road equipment that moves material as well as what can be pretty capital intense fixed facilities that convert material. So, part of my role in the organization is to help us make those decisions in the context of what's important to our customers.

[00:08:31] Dominique: To dig into that mental image a little more 'cause I'm just really curious to hear you give some tangibles. If we're thinking about maybe kinda like a connected line, so we have like the person who has organics needs to get collected and that dairy farmer that you mentioned. Can you just kind of walk us through with some potentially fake examples of maybe like a concern or like a unique problem that Denali was able to solve in that equation. So like helping us understand like how do you collect? How do you make it easy for them? How do you support the dairy farmer? Can you paint that for us?

[00:09:02] Mason: I think, the best circular link I can give you is, we work with many national grocers to create programs where on a recurring basis, we run routes that show up to their location, collect their material, and really collect their food waste.

So anything that they were not able to sell or donate through their internal programs, the next step on the chain is our system before landfill. And so, once products comes to us, we collect the material and route that to a broad network of recycling facilities.

To use one example, we have facilities in Texas that take receipt of the material, and run our composting process and create a value added product on the backend that's sold either locally to farmers or landscapers or developed into a bagged product.

[00:09:51] Christy: Mason, I have to give kind of a shout out to your team, the Denali team overall, I think. To set it up, I wanna give you a lens of working in hospitality, so food service and grocers. And oftentimes one of the challenges that we have is sort of a sorting process and how do we get the right products in the right bin? And you might have thousands of employees managing this. One of the solutions that I've seen that Denali has been really impactful of is the depackaging process that you have. Maybe you could give us an overview of what does depackaging mean and why is that a game changer for picking up increased organics?

[00:10:30] Mason: Sure, yeah. So, depackaging is a process that is relying on a piece of capital equipment. And there are many manufacturers of this equipment. The application really originated in Europe to drive a lot of their diversion goals. And over the years was rolled out in some areas of the US but within the last couple of years, Denali, as well as the broader industry has really adopted that equipment and that technology, that process to do really a couple of things. So when you think about generators of food waste, one of the things that has been a challenge in the past is manually depackaging material. So that takes a lot of labor hours. But also is something that is hard to maintain consistently over a long period of time. So it leads to levels of contamination and inconsistency. So, kind of similar to that, the other thing that depackaging does is as an operator of a recycling facility, allows us to create more control of what's coming into our facility and really manage contamination.

So it's created a twofold benefit, I think for us and for the industry, and really at the end of the day for the generators. I believe it's making organics diversion more simple and straightforward, and more consistent. So that's something that, again, it's been a change in the industry and something that we've really taken an active role in.

[00:11:47] Christy: Yeah. I had an opportunity to be at Stop Food Waste Day on Wednesday of this week as we're recording this. And in that opportunity I was able to hear from a couple of your clients directly. And this wasn't planned, this just happened by the way. But I just think that I want to talk about how impactful depackaging is in that it is a very difficult aspect to overcome in an operation standpoint. And I think that it has been the ability to have the repackaging and the amount of organics recycling locations that you have has really provided an avenue, a solution for so many partners out there. And so I just wanted to thank you and the Denali team for that.

But one of the things that I thought was really great. On stage, the Denali team got a shout out, not just for the organics recycling and what was happening. It was actually the education, the helping to understand what's happening. And I just think that is worth mentioning because it shows that it's not just a transactional service that you're providing.

Denali is really focused on the customer and the solution and meeting customers where they are. So I just wanted to share that with you because I think we should always give out the flowers to everyone, but sometimes in this work we often see challenges and don't get to see or hear the rewards.

So, thanks for what you guys are doing. That was a great shout out.

[00:13:10] Mason: I really appreciate that, Christy. And, you know, I said this before, but I truly mean it. I mean, we've got a fantastic team and I'm thankful to get to show up to work with those folks every day. There's a lot of passion about what we do and there's a lot of care for being good stewards of our customers and the broader stakeholders in the communities we operate. So, it's always good to get that feedback. So thank you.

[00:13:30] Dominique: Yeah. And also just a huge testament to the aspect of the work that you focus on too. You're specifically looking at where customers are struggling. I think repackaging also is a great example of where, at one point that must have been like a huge pain point. And been a reason that people couldn't collect organics.

And that focus of, okay, like we'll come back to you with a solution versus like, guess we can't service large grocery stores. I think that speaks to also just like your focus on really solving the problem. And we're gonna have to have a mindset of continuous improvement and listening to get a lot of these problems solved. So I'm happy that you're in this space doing that. 

I was curious to shift gears, kinda looking ahead a little bit, what opportunity do you still see in this space? what are some roadblocks that haven't been solved yet, and things that you're focused on looking ahead at our waste problem broadly?

[00:14:18] Mason: Yeah, no, that's a really exciting topic. So, you know, one of the things that you've seen taking place over the last couple years is the corporate community and, you know, the commercial community has driven a lot of activity in diversion from landfill but there's still a lot to go.

And one of the tools that some states have used is diversion mandates. You're seeing that in a couple states on the west coast, a couple states in the northeast and outside of that. Even really across the country or places that you wouldn't think have maybe the same political alignment as some of those areas have the same problem, which is reduced landfill capacity, increasing landfill costs.

And all of them are seeing, you know, somewhere in the range of 20 to 30% of what's going through those landfills as organic materials. So in an effort to, I think a lot, there are a lot of communities across the country that are thinking about how do we increase our reliance on this particular piece of infrastructure and recycle some of not just food waste, but other things that are going into that landfill. And that question or that thought process is a really good start. But one of the things that's really necessary, I and we believe is, a lot of new infrastructure to support that shift. So, I could give you a lot of examples, but you know, there's a lot of need and opportunity to continue to build out organics recycling infrastructure across the country to really allow diversion to happen at the scale required to address, again, landfill capacity constraints, the amount of organic waste going through the landfill and community goals to divert that from the landfill.

[00:15:54] Dominique: We got a lot of problems still to solve.

[00:15:56] Mason: Yeah. But I mean, it's opportunity, right? It's opportunity. And you know, and I think for us, what I think we've proven is it's not this insurmountable problem. It's something that with the right partnerships, the right community engagement, the right investment that you can make happen.

[00:16:09] Dominique: Yeah, well said. And well bow tied around our conversation here. But I appreciate hearing someone so deep in this space share what they see as opportunity because I think it's also just so interesting and enlightening for folks that are curious about looking ahead and seeing what's coming, so thank you for that.

[00:16:25] Mason: Thank you. What are you guys seeing in through your lens within the sustainability space, anything that you can share with me and I can kind of take back to my day to day?

[00:16:34] Dominique: That's a good question. I'll let Christy go first.

[00:16:36] Christy: Yeah, I think that I would say two things. One has been a historical sort of trend that we see in my opinion, is there's so much optimism in youth. And there's also this question of like they're not constrained. Like oftentimes, I think as we grow up, we begin to see these boundaries and accept some boundaries.

I think youth, younger people do not accept those boundaries and they question. And what I love to see about that is you start to see innovation in that. K through 12 environment that then continues to transition into higher ed, healthcare, businesses and such. So I love that, that that's a space of innovation.

And I think tapping into the kids just saying, "Well, why not? Why can't we do that? It makes sense," I think it challenges all of us in the space of where we might accept certain circumstances. So I think that's a place to watch and innovate. And also though I think we're seeing tremendous energy around sports in general. Sports are a competitive sort of place, so there's a natural idea of like being competitive and framing that in some ways of whether it is competition by sport, you know, is NASCAR doing better or worse than NFL football stadiums or Major League and Hockey 'cause we're seeing so much activity in the professional sports leagues. And I also think with the expansion of sports teams and more women in sports teams that are coming out and the increase in volleyball that we're seeing as a new professional sport, that's only increasing the opportunities to take advantage in that area.

So those are some things that I'm watching and trying to pay attention to. How does that resonate with what you're seeing, Dominique and same thing back to you, Mason.

[00:18:21] Dominique: Well, yeah, I was gonna comment that this is, I feel like it's notable. This is the first time a guest has asked us a question and I love that. I think that we legally have to leave it in now because that's just a fun thing. So thank you for caring what we're thinking. But for me, my mind went to, I think for one, I really like the things that you said around like the waste space and like the pressures that are happening in different spaces.

And just how urgency is there, but like lack of resources is also a problem. I also do love the problems you're solving genuinely, with Denali. But I think for me, given the kind of political climate and like the direction of like lack of regulation to put it simply, I think I've actually found a lot of hope in seeing the energy rise up on a local level.

I think where opportunity exists from my point of view is action and energy on the ground level for the local government and community leaders seeking to find ways to use what they have to create the change that maybe they're waiting for regulation to rationalize. But I think the gap is lack of resources and capacity for those folks who've not had that for a long time. And so, personally, I work a lot on capacity building for those organizations and kind of building systems around them because while technology is amazing and powerful, a lot of the times it's not introduced in local government and like solid waste authorities and some of these like community organizations.

So I think there's definitely a need to help those folks capacity build because we need them now more than ever.

[00:19:56] Mason: Wow. That's great. I mean, great insight. I think you're so right, Dominique. I mean, there was this, I think that at the beginning of 2025 there was a lot of activity around kind of reevaluating our federal commitments to sustainability or to regulation as you said.

And I think that It's been pretty interesting from our standpoint to see the continued commitment from the private sector. But I think your insight on, you know, from the state and local is so true as well. There's still a lot out there.

And at the end of the day, I think we're in an environment where you've got to present the ROI of those activities in a way that maybe is a bit different than it was.

And so yeah, I mean, I think as long as folks are thinking in that way, then projects will be, you know, we'll be invested in, we'll be rolled out and all of that. So, I appreciate you sharing that. And then likewise, Christy, I think your perspective on K-12 and sports is great. I mean, especially in the context of food diversion. I find it interesting because it's really, it's a way to not only make short-term impact, right? Hey, let's make sure your event is sustainable. Let's make sure your school is diverting from the landfill.

But you're also training the next generation, or you're training members of the community what good looks like that they can then take from that application, and do it and be inspired to do things differently. So, we've seen that in some of our K through 12 customers, that something that's so exciting for them is to see their students grow up in their system and learn, Hey, this is how we do it in this district where we divert, you know? So thank you for sharing that. That's great for me to hear.

[00:21:26] Christy: Well, Mason, this conversation has been so much fun. There's so much we could keep talking about and I really love your passion and energy and how you're connecting all of this from your love of storytelling and that humor centered approach that we've been talking about, but with the real world perspective of what we need to do to make all this happen.

So that is just so great. How can people connect with you, Mason, because I know we're gonna have some folks reaching out to you after this podcast.

[00:21:53] Mason: Yeah, well, please follow Denali on LinkedIn. And can visit us at our website as well, denalicorp.com. And you can find me on LinkedIn as well. I like to share from time to time some of the exciting things we're doing.

[00:22:04] Christy: That's amazing. Thank you, Mason.

[00:22:06] Dominique: Yeah. Thanks for chatting with us again. This has been great.

[00:22:09] Christy: Each guest brings a different approach to sustainability. We're here to highlight the people doing the work that inspires others because climate action takes many forms.

[00:22:16] Dominique: As always, you can find our episodes and support the show at thegreenchampions.com. If you enjoyed the episode, please follow, subscribe, and leave us a review. And if you're podcast platform, you can find us on LinkedIn, on Instagram, @greenchampionspod. Our music is by Zayn Dweik. Thanks for listening to Green Champions.

We'll dig into our next sustainability success story in our next episode.