By Matthew Kert, November 1, 2012
FastRack is a simple to use racking, draining and storing system for empty beer bottles. North American made; FastRack increases the beer bottle recycling speed by 20%-30%, which translates into 10 to over 150 hours of saved labour annually for bar owners who are adopting it.
Workplace accidents in bars and restaurants caused by broken glass from beer bottles is a major hazard — fruit fly infested beer bottles stored in cardboard beer boxes often get soggy and unstable as bottles are thrown into them behind the bar. FastRack has been endorsed by the “Responsible Bartenders of America” and has been getting glowing reviews from people such as; Andrew Wells, CEO of Responsible Bartenders of America, Thomas Phelan, Banquet Manager of Delta Hotel Halifax and Mark Teneycke, Director of Operations for the Pegasus Group of Companies. See video below:
The biggest comments thus far have been about the increased efficiency, the elimination of bottle breakage and the elimination of fruit flies. Almost all major chains that have locations in Toronto are already using FastRacks, with multiple bar/restaurant and hotel chains beginning the process of rolling FastRack across all of their locations. And the market is big, with Canada having a national bottle and 12 US states having bottle bills – requiring all bottles to be recycled. This translates into tens of millions of bottles changing hands and a big opportunity for FastRack.
FastRack is now the brainchild of two young entrepreneurs, Mitchell Lesbirel and Casey Binkley, who met at Dalhousie University in the Bachelor of Management Program and have relocated to Toronto to launch the business. FastRack is the culmination of almost two years of research and development and a lot of sweat equity!
“We are launching an Indiegogo campaign in 10-14 days. The funds recieved from this crowdfunding platform will be used to make improvements to our current FastRack mold and to build a new mold for our FastRack Tray. We will be offering a dozen different reward levels. We would love if everyone reading this visited our Indiegogo page and either pledged or passed it along to their networks.” says Mitchell Lesbirel.
When asked how the Altitude Accelerator has helped, Mitchell says; “RIC has introduced us to grant programs and guided us through the process of completing them. In addition, they have introduced us to some key contacts to further grow FastRack – including the Regional Alliance members. Further, the RIC EIRs and advisers acted as a fantastic sounding board for FastRack”
