Transfer and Disposal Services. We own or operate 96 transfer stations. We deposit waste at these
stations, as do other private haulers and municipal haulers, for compaction and transfer to trailers for transport
to disposal sites or recycling facilities. As of December 31, 2004, we owned or operated 58 landÑlls, which had
approximately 8,904 permitted acres and total available permitted and probable expansion disposal capacity of
approximately 1.7 billion in-place cubic yards. The in-place capacity of our landÑlls is subject to change based
on engineering factors, requirements of regulatory authorities and the ability to expand our sites successfully.
Some of our landÑlls accept non-hazardous special waste, including utility ash, asbestos and contaminated
soils. See ""Ì Properties.''
Most of our existing landÑll sites have the potential for expanded disposal capacity beyond the currently
permitted acreage. We monitor the availability of permitted disposal capacity at each of our landÑlls and
evaluate whether to pursue expansion at a given landÑll based on estimated future waste volumes and prices,
market needs, remaining capacity and likelihood of obtaining an expansion. To satisfy future disposal demand,
we are currently seeking to expand permitted capacity at certain of our landÑlls, although no assurances can be
made that all future expansions will be permitted as designed.
Other Services. We have 35 materials recovery facilities and other recycling operations, which are
generally required to fulÑll our obligations under long-term municipal contracts for residential collection
services. These facilities sort recyclable paper, aluminum, glass and other materials. Most of these recyclable
materials are internally collected by our residential collection operations. In some areas, we receive
commercial and industrial solid waste that is sorted at our facilities into recyclable materials and non-
recyclable waste. The recyclable materials are salvaged, repackaged and sold to third parties and the non-
recyclable waste is disposed of at landÑlls or incinerators. Wherever possible, our strategy is to reduce our
exposure to Öuctuations in recyclable commodity prices by utilizing third party recycling facilities, thereby
minimizing our recycling investment.
We provide remediation and other heavy construction services primarily through our subsidiary located in
Missouri.
We also have a Texas-based compost, mulch and soil business at which yard, mill and other waste is
processed, packaged and sold as various products.
Sales and Marketing
We seek to provide quality services that will enable our company to maintain high levels of customer
satisfaction. We derive our business from a broad customer base which we believe will enable our company to
experience stable growth. We focus our marketing eÅorts on continuing and expanding business with existing
customers, as well as attracting new customers.
We employ approximately 500 sales and marketing employees. Our sales and marketing strategy is to
provide high-quality, comprehensive solid waste collection, recycling, transfer and disposal services to our
customers at competitive prices. We target potential customers of all sizes, from small quantity generators to
large ""Fortune 500'' companies and municipalities.
Most of our marketing activity is local in nature. However, in 2000 we initiated a national accounts
program in response to our customers' needs.
We generally do not change the tradenames of the local businesses we acquire, and therefore we do not
operate nationally under any one mark or tradename. Rather, we rely on the goodwill associated with the
acquired companies' local tradenames as used in each geographic market in which we operate.
Customers
We provide services to commercial, industrial, municipal and residential customers. No one customer has
individually accounted for more than 10% of our consolidated revenue or of our reportable segment revenue in