National Old Stuff Day is a holiday that encourages everyone to get rid of all of the junk and clutter in their life and to add new things to their life. Too many of us have outdated, broken, or useless items cluttering our homes and this is the day to address all of that stuff. This holiday is observed on the 2nd of March and is the perfect day for everyone to begin a new spring cleaning regimen.

The History Of National Old Stuff Day

Unfortunately, we were unable to uncover the origins of this holiday. All we can assume is that whoever invented it decided that they wanted to rid their homes of junk. We’ll continue to search for this holiday’s origins and will update this section as necessary.

Amazing Facts About Junk

Hopefully, we’re not cluttering up our holiday by adding a section about junk on it, but we just couldn’t resist. After all, if getting rid of junk is the purpose of this holiday, then it’s important that we talk a little bit about junk.

• Some of the junk that’s been pulled from the world’s oceans include rubber ducks, fireplaces, bowling balls, even action figures.
• In 2014, the number one piece of trash picked up on shorelines and beaches were cigarette butts.
• Single-use plastics are now one of the main pollutants that wind up on shorelines.
• Every year, 12-million tons of plastic end up in the ocean and it increases every year.
• San Francisco recycles up to 80% of the waste it generates.
• Approximately half of all Americans replace their cellphones on a yearly basis.
• U.S consignment shops, thrift shops, and antique stores ring up over $17 billion in profit every year.
• Goodwill Industries posts almost $4 billion in sales across 3,000 stores.
• The average American produces almost 5 pounds of trash per day.
• The average American only recycles or composts 1.5-pounds of trash per day.
• Scrap recycling creates almost half a million jobs in the United States.
• From 1972 to 2003 in the United States, more than a trillion aluminum beverage cans ended up in landfills.
• The Guinness World Record for the most consumer electronics recycled during a one-week period of time was set in April of 2015. 1,180,442 million pounds were recycled.
• In the U.S., there are over 3,000 community-based composting programs in operation.

Observing National Old Stuff Day

Want to observe this holiday? If you do, then the first thing that you’re going to want to do is to take stock of the stuff that you own. Make a list and decide whether what you own is junk that you can get rid of or if it’s still important to you. Once you’ve decided on what’s junk and what’s not, you can then decide how to get rid of the stuff. Common ways include throwing it away, giving it to a charitable organization, or even selling it. When you’re finished, use the hashtag #NationalOldStuffDay to let us know how it went.