The Dumpster Redeemer

Some people make a living by turning trash into treasure. 

It's a familiar scene at college graduations.

Parents proudly hold up their smartphones, eager to capture photos of their capped-and-gowned progeny. It's called "commencement" -- a day of hopes and dreams, of imagining who and what their sons and daughters will one day become.

It's a pretty fair bet none of those parents ever pictured their kids as trash-pickers.

But hold on a second. What if their trash-picking offspring could pull in a quarter of a million dollars a year?


The dumpster redeemer

This is what Matt Malone, an Austin, Texas, security consultant, estimates he could make in a year if he gave up his day job and pursued his weekend hobby full-time -- a cool quarter million.

Every weekend, Malone leaves corporate life behind, climbs into his Chevy Avalanche and goes dumpster-diving.

Yes, dumpster-diving. But not just any old dumpsters. Malone has learned to be discriminating. He targets dumpsters behind retail chain-stores. Much of what he finds there are store returns: items...