Recycling Center Revenue Benchmark

Average Recycling Center Revenue per Year 2022 Economic Census

The 2022 Economic Census counts every materials recovery facility with paid employees and publishes their combined annual receipts, which include tipping fees and the sale of sorted commodities. Dividing that total by the number of facilities gives the average annual revenue per employer establishment shown below.

≈$5,479,000 /year

Average annual gross revenue per employer establishment

How this is calculated: about $8.4 billion in combined annual receipts divided by 1,537 employer establishments works out to an average annual revenue of $5,479,000 per employer establishment.

Scope: Materials Recovery Facilities, NAICS 562920. The Census category is Materials Recovery Facilities, which counts facilities sorting and processing mixed recyclable materials into marketable commodities. Scrap metal dealers are counted in wholesale trade and waste collection companies in their own category. Classified separately in group 5629: 562910 Remediation Services; 562991 Septic Tank and Related Services; 562998 All Other Miscellaneous Waste Management Services. Nothing outside that code is counted on this page.

Source US Census Bureau, 2022 Economic Census, Summary Statistics (ECNBASIC): ESTAB, RCPTOT and PAYANN by NAICS · Vintage 2022 Economic Census · Calculation BusinessNES · Accessed September 2026

Employer Establishments at Year Five Smaller cohort

Remediation and other waste management services, NAICS 5629, the 2018 starting count compared with the count of five-year-old establishments in 2023.

Across the 2014 to 2018 cohorts, five-year results ranged from 64.9 to 68.5 percent. This benchmark covers Remediation and other waste management services, NAICS 5629, as a whole, and this category accounts for 1,537 of the 12,892 employer establishments in it. A count by age is not a survival rate, because the figures compare two headcounts rather than follow one set of businesses.

Payroll as a Share of Revenue Official data

Payroll divided by receipts, both as published for the same year.

Payroll share of receipts, Materials Recovery Facilities, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

Approximately 17.0 percent of every revenue dollar goes to annual payroll, a small share because sorting lines, balers and loaders do much of the work and because commodity sales and tipping fees carry the revenue, while sorters, operators and drivers form the crew.

Payroll here excludes benefits, employer taxes and owner compensation, and it excludes sorting equipment, balers, energy, residue disposal and transport, which together carry much of what a facility spends.

Business Scale and Ownership Structure Official data

How large the average establishment is, and whether the population is independent operators or multi-site companies.

Scale and ownership, Materials Recovery Facilities, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

The average establishment employed about 19.7 people, and the industry averaged 1.3 employer establishments per firm, which confirms that multi-establishment ownership exists in the published population without showing how establishments are distributed across firms. As an illustration, that headcount could be sorting line operators, sorters, loader drivers and maintenance staff.

These are arithmetic industry averages. They state the size of the average establishment and show that multi-establishment ownership exists. They do not show the distribution of business sizes and they do not measure market concentration.

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Data Source Notice

This product uses the Census Bureau Data API but is not endorsed or certified by the Census Bureau.

Figures above are from the 2022 Economic Census reference year, released by the Census Bureau in 2024 and 2025; markets have moved since.

Questions Worth Asking BusinessNES analysis

Recycling Center: what commodity prices, contamination and municipal contracts do to a facility's average.

Before you rely on this benchmark

• Where were commodity prices that year? Baled cardboard, plastics and metals sell at prices that swing with global demand and trade policy, and a facility's receipts move with them even when the tons processed do not. The reference year shows one moment in a market that rarely stands still.
• Who pays the tipping fee? Municipalities and haulers pay to deliver material under contracts that may share commodity revenue or charge a fixed fee, and those terms decide how much market risk the facility carries. Contract structure is the heart of the business and invisible in receipts.
• How contaminated is the stream? Non-recyclable material mixed into the stream must be sorted out and landfilled at the facility's cost, and contamination rates vary with local programs. Residue disposal is a large cost outside a revenue figure.
• How automated is the line? Optical sorters, screens and robotics raise throughput and purity at a capital cost that only volume repays, while hand sorting keeps costs variable, and facilities span that whole range.
• Where do the bales go? Mills and processors that buy sorted material may be nearby or overseas, and export markets can open or close with trade policy. Access to buyers shapes what a facility can earn per ton.
• Are scrap yards counted here? Scrap metal dealers and auto salvage yards are counted in wholesale trade, so this figure covers facilities processing mixed recyclables rather than scrap buyers. The scope note above spells out what the category leaves out.