CleanScapes takes a sustainable approach to waste management.

Chris Martin, an entrepreneur from Seattle’s Pioneer Square neighborhood, has a knack for creating efficient systems. More than a decade ago, Martin began using his neighborhood, an area once known as a haven for raucous night owls and the down and out, as a test bed for a waste collection scheme that has proven to turn profits and reduce the amount of trash headed to landfills.

With his company CleanScapes, Martin set out to make Dumpsters a thing of the past and reduce the waste stream to boot. Customers receive color-coded bags for trash, recycling and compost, all of which CleanScapes picks up multiple times per day. The program nearly doubled waste reduction efforts in Pioneer Square.

The company has come a long way: It expanded operations into Portland and San Francisco, posted $12million in annual sales in 2007 and employs about 80people. Last year, the company won a municipal waste collection contract worth approximately $40 million over seven years with the city of Shoreline, a town of 53,000 directly north of Seattle. And earlier this year, CleanScapes won another contract worth nearly $80 million to collect waste in central Seattle.

In an attempt to reduce fuel costs and greenhouse gas emissions, Martin says he plans to help customers reduce the amount of waste, including recycling and compostable materials, they produce in the first place.

“You get conservation messaging with your water and electric bills,” Martin says. “But when was the last time you got a message on waste reduction from the garbage company? If we pick up a smaller amount of materials, then we can service more houses with each truck.”

CleanScapes is one of the region’s first collection companies to offer auditing and collection services for the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Existing Buildings (LEED-EB) program.

For now, CleanScapes is focusing on its latest waste-reduction opportunity, Martin says. But over the next 10years, he says he plans to bid on more collection contracts in King County and continue to build street cleaning, construction recycling and other businesses the company runs in Portland and San Francisco.