At Sahd Metal Recycling, you can trade in aluminum cans, machinery and more for cash. Visit their website for current prices and acceptable and unacceptable materials.

Arlin Benner was just a kid when he made the first of many trips with his father to Sahd Metal Recycling in Columbia.

Today, more than four decades later, the Mount Joy dairy farmer continues that tradition - recycling what he no longer needs and finding useful treasures at Sahd’s 20-plus-acre facility at 1045 Lancaster Ave.

For more than 80 years and three generations, Sahd Metal Recycling has been a Lancaster County mainstay - continually leading the way in the recycling industry with investments in green technology and equipment. Today, cousins Dan and Mike Sahd have carried on the tradition from their fathers Ron and Mike and uncles Frank and Wayne, managing the business with a focus on customer service to industrial manufacturing facilities, residential households and the local farming community.

“When items are obsolete, having them enter the recycling process allows the material to be repurposed for new equipment in a sustainable manner,” says client relations specialist Aileen Sahd Romich, Wayne’s daughter. “No matter what metal the old items are made of the cost of processing and remelting pales in comparison to the energy costs and environmental impact of digging for new ore in the ground.” 

At Sahd Metal Recycling, you can trade in aluminum cans, machinery and more for cash. Visit their website for current prices and acceptable and unacceptable materials.

Sahd Metal Recycling accepts everything from old stoves, frying pans and bicycles to aluminum cans and electrical wire. They also have a large inventory of usable metal for sale at reasonable prices.

Sahd is committed to helping customers sustainably recycle while getting the maximum value for their metals. 

For farmers like Benner, the service has many benefits. Over the years, Benner has recycled everything from worn-out equipment parts to old gates and freestalls at the Sahd facility.

“It’s a way to dispose of steel and get some pizza money out of it,” he jokes.

He likes the treasures he’s found even more: pallet racking, used ibeams, steel pipes and angle irons, just to name a few. 

“There’s times when you just need some heavy steel beams or posts that would be very costly if you bought them new,” he says. “You get a lot more for your money.

“I enjoy just going over there and looking around,” Benner says. “You find stuff and say, ‘Hey, I can put that to good use.’”

Farmers are often in Sahd’s scrap yard looking for bargains on structural steel, ibeams, angle, rebar, box tubing and pipe, along with usable stainless steel and aluminum.

Sahd Metal Recycling’s loyalty program can save customers even more in 2022, with a 3% discount on purchases and a 3% price bump when selling all year long. Plus, loyalty program members can enjoy a 10% discount on metal purchases in January.

For farmers who want to recycle, here are some tips:

Sahd Metal Recycling accepts an array of items, including old equipment (with all fluids and fluid-bearing items removed), motors, lead-acid batteries, augers, irrigation equipment, chicken house roofing, implements and any stray metal around the farm. Among the items they do not accept are those containing asbestos, free-flowing liquids, hazardous waste, corrosive, combustible or explosive materials. For a complete list of acceptable and prohibited items, visit https://recycleyourmetal.com/sell-metal.

The more sorting down to the specific grade of metal and the more sorted the load is on the truck or trailer, the more efficient the process for the farmer and the better the pay. In general, an item that doesn’t stick to a magnet is worth more than an item that does. For a list of current prices, visit https://recycleyourmetal.com/scrap-metal-prices.

Sahd Metal Recycling offers pickup service and 24-hour turnaround dumpster service for big jobs. Farmers can also email photos for pricing estimates based on quality and quantity to dan@recycleyourmetal.com. Farmers looking to buy can get a preview of what’s available, along with prices, by searching for Sahd Metal Recycling on Facebook Marketplace. 

Dan Sahd, owner of Sahd Metal Recycling, breaks down the changes last year that affected scrap metal prices and what it can tell us about what to expect in 2022.

Of course, some customers, like Benner, still prefer the in-person treasure hunt.

“You just never know what they have there,” Benner says, recalling that he once bought the axle and the dump bed of a 10-wheeler truck and converted them into a trailer that he could pull with his tractor. “That thing’s really handy.”

On another trip to Sahd’s scrap yard, he bought a second dump trailer. That one, he says, has an important job: hauling scrap metal to the recycling center.

For more information, visit recycleyourmetal.com and Sahd Metal Recycling on Facebook, or call 717-684-8506.

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