I was tempted to put another in our kitchen redo since we got used to having a compactor, but I'm so glad we got a 2-can pull out drawer instead.

So one can is recycling and one is trash? Do you have to open it with your hand though? I do wish we had a built in recycling area though but would hate to go back to "hand opened" trash.

Yes, the drawer is manual pull out and we try to use one for recycle.

Both kitchen designers I worked with seemed to think compactors are very much out of favor.

I liked ours enough, but it did smell from time to time.

I dispensed with a disposal. I, too, have a pull-out with two compartments: Garbage and Recycling. (No pedal model was available, or I'd have had one of those!)

It is amazing how little actual garbage we generate; DH takes it out twice a week, primarily to avoid odors. We have twice-weekly pickup; could easily go two weeks in winter.

If you have a compactor, does that mean you don't recycle? We have a huge bin that gets full enough to be set out alternate weeks. TONS of recycling for every bit of garbage.

Here's a composter in a cabinet. Do you think they really work? We should compost but don't. A compost pile seems like another "live" thing to take care of; no thanks! ☹️

I would never have a trash compactor because I have a personal phobia about garbage in the house. It's my issue, I am fully aware it's irrational and I really wish I could get past it....but, every stitch of garbage in the house, either regular trash or compost, has to go outside every single night. Every bathroom has to be checked...I just can't go to bed until all the garbage is out of the house...drives DH absolutely nuts.

Wow DC. That must be an exhausting compulsion for you. We had one in a prior house. I found we didn't take the icky smelly can't be recycled trash out often enough. So we have a 2 can pull out. I hope to put a servo in it once we recover from the cash flow shock this redo is causing.

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The smells, unhygienic, etc. Every house that I visit with a compactor was disgusting whenever they asked me to throw away the trash.

There was crap down the side, back and front.

We had a compactor for a while when I was growing up and I remember not liking it and smell problems and working hard at grinding in the disposal anything we could (currently large things I toss and just grind what rinses off plates etc). But we have had one for 5 years that came with our current house and we are planning a kitchen redo and intend to get a new one. We do recycle and have a bin for that under the sink. We probably throw away a few things that could be recycled as we still create lots of trash so perhaps I should review what is recyclable but I do still find a compactor bag or 2 a week of trash. The compactor not only lessens the frequency of emptying it but in our case we pay for trash pickup by volume and we'd go over our size and need to pay more if we didn't have the compactor. If we took the trash to the dump ourselves there is a higher charge for a compactor bag but with home pickup they don't get that and I just use plastic garbage bags anyway. As far as smell, I don't really have a problem but I also don't mind taking it out before it is full if I feel I need to (if it starts to smell). If there is something really funky that does need to be thrown out I take that right to the garage (like spoiled food).

I wish there was a compactor recycle combo unit that only crushed the non recycle part but all fit in one drawer. I am thinking of a compactor by my clean up sink and I will have an island prep area where I was going to to a 2 part trash/recycle pull out. I think most of the recycle gets generated from prep (or wine bottles and it is also near the fridge). Although I have more space by the main sink I could do a whole separate recycle bin there and a narrower trash by he island prep sink.

I know this isn't much help... we had one when I was a kid. My recollection is that it got so heavy that my mom couldn't carry it, so my dad had to be the one to take it out. Giving it to a child to take out as a chore was out of the question. It broke eventually so we just used it as a regular trash can & never bothered to repair it.

When we redid our kitchen 13 years ago we put in a trash compacter. We have never, ever used it. Not one bag of garbage. Obviously, I don't even know what I would put in it. We have a large recycling bin, garbage disposals in both sinks, and a garbage can for the odds and ends, which includes organic waste.

We are planning on redoing the kitchen and the compacter is one of the items that I intend to pull out. I'm debating whether it should go into a utility room, since it's never been used and is in fine shape. As part of that effort, I searched in this forum on the topic of compacters and it seems that the general advice is not to use them for organic waste, but people seem to like them. So what are they used for? What do you put in them?

I am much more interested in a getting composting device. We do not currently compost - but I would really like to. It seems like a major concern would be odor control.

One thing about compoating is it should be small because you will have to empty it frequently. I compost and have two large rolling bins outside so I dump my little indoor can everyday. My indoor can is insulated, and it will start to break down the food inside very quickly. It was half full when we left for 4 or 5 days, and it was slush when I came back and saw the fruit flies.

kfpwvt, yes! It would be great if it had an extra bin/area for recycling. Ours is about 17 inches deep so there's about 8 inches of wasted space behind it. Listen up, trash compactor manufacturers! We want an extra area to stash recylcables in our compactors the next time you redesign them!

Carrie B, yes it does get quite heavy and hard to pull out when "fully loaded" which is why my husband empties it 100% of the time; one more reason to LOVE it in MY opinion LOL. As if women don't do enough around the house already; I am all for any chore that can be made 100% dh's responsibility tee hee.

Shortly after we ordered two disposals for our new kitchen, we received notice from our garbage company that we could add all food waste to our green bins. As a result, we rarely use the disposals. We have a trash pullout with Blum Servo Drive (highly recommend!) - one covered bin is for food waste and the other (open) is for recycling (paper, metal, plastic). We keep a very small trash can in the pantry for real trash...that goes out every two weeks or so. It works perfectly for us.

No love here because we hardly make any trash in the kitchen - almost everything is compostable (run by city so includes lots of things that my garden wouldn't take like paper cups and pizza boxes) or recyclable. We don't have to take the trash out more than once a week anyway so I'm not sure what the point would be and I would still have to find a space for recyclables. I suspect they were more practical when no one recycled anything (although people are still surprisingly bad at that I guess....). I've seen posts here about trash cabs that you can open hands free so I don't think you need a compactor for this reason.

I was also going to suggest the Blum servo drive if you have an aversion to manually opening the trash.

We replaced our 14 year old compactor last year when we updated all of our appliances to stainless. The new Kitchenaid has been working out great. It was an easy choice to put one in since we already had the opening but I actually like it and would consider putting one in a new kitchen.

Very stinky food trash goes outside right away and we'll take the bag out if it starts to smell but usually don't need to until weekly trash day. I'm very careful about not compacting without putting clean paper on top first (junk mail is perfect for this - I keep mail catalogues in a nearby drawer and pull off a few sheets) and I use heavy compactor bags. The kids also know to carefully scrape plates and to put dirty paper plates in with the dirty side down, so all the working parts stay very clean.

No compactor for the same reasons as iharpi. I keep my compostables in
the fridge and freezer. I have a small bowl in fridge which I empty
into the freezer of my fridge when full. So here step one is to scrape
all dishes then deposit that into fridge bowl, then when full into
freezer box. Then when that's full away it goes into city container. I
find I keep fruit flies at a minimum inside the house and don't have as many flies
around the city container as my neighbors do, since the compostables are frozen at first.
The garbage is picked up only once every two weeks here. Compostables
and recycling is picked up once a week.

I'm a single guy and I've had a compactor since 2003. I love it. I recycle and put all food waste down the disposal. My compactor bag can sometimes go for 3 weeks without being changed. I've never had a smelly compactor since I rinse anything that has had food in it

I always thought compactors were for rural areas where there was no pick up service and you have to drive your own stuff to the dump....

I'm one of the minority - I love our compactor. My husband had it before he met me - I'd never seen one before, but I love it. Anything that is likely to be super smelly (chicken bones, etc) we'll run down to the outside trash, so the compactor smells fine. We empty it once a week the night before the trash people come, and boom, done. :)

We bought a house with a compacter and used it only as a regular garbage can for a few years.

A couple of years ago I decided to try it out, and bought compactor bags... holy cow, I didn't know what I'd been missing! WE LOVE our compactor. LOVE IT. We are a very active household with four kids (and lots of friends) so the bag still goes out every few days.

I love love love my compactor as well. But I take flesh trash, (chicken fat, etc) to the outdoor trashcan, else I'd have a smelly mess. Also since I started composting veggies. And recycling plastics, I don't have that much trash. Ea week after emptying Compactor I spray w/Lysol and put new bag--presto, fresh as a daisy

Yay, I found a little bit of compactor love! It would definitely be a requirement for me in a new kitchen.

Same here. The one thing DH insisted on.

One bag/week, and unlike our previous compactor (by GE, which was terrible and cut off it's own power supply several time during compacting ), our KA doesn't get trash residues front, center, left, behind....

Mine is a KitchenAid as well.

Funny thing... We were easily filling our huge curbside garbage everyweek, and needing to use additional 50 gallon containers. I ended up getting another huge curbside can from my waste company, at an additional fee per month.

Two weeks later, I started using the compactor. Now we NEVER use that second can!

I'm just not a fan of trash compactors. I grew up with one but it was only used to crush empty aluminum cans to take to the recycling facility which was really a waste of a compactor!

My in-laws have one (which they love) that is probably 30+ years old and they put all of their garbage in it but do not put any food scraps or anything in it to avoid any smells. To me, that's also a waste! So, when they peel potatoes for example, they don't put them down the garbage disposal of course nor do they put them in the compactor. It just doesn't make sense.

I also wouldn't want a pull-out trash cabinet because of smells. I find them very unsanitary having them exposed in the cabinet. I like having a stand alone garbage can with a lid so I can put anything in it from peels, fish bones, or anything else. Every time I take the garbage out I wipe down the trash can & pull out liner (inside and out) with a disinfectant wipe. We also recycle which gets picked up weekly just like the trash. There is also yard waste pick up which we can put food scraps and pizza boxes in, however right now we don't have that service due to where we're living...once our house is done being built at the end of June we'll have that again.

In California, not recycling as much as possible is like not bathing and taking public transit. Very un-PC, LOL!

Recycling here differs from city to city, depending on who wins what waste contract where. In our city, recycling is picked up with the weekly garbage collection and compostables. Most of the time our trash container, which is the smallest, is barely half-full.

- Paper and plastics recycling: they take ALL plastics. At first we sorted by number (some plastics weren't recyclable) but several years ago it changed and we now can toss any hard or flexible plastics in, along with all papers. As I am a catalog junkie, this is great. And it's wonderful to be able to toss those hideous clamshell packages into recycling. Even wax cartons, such as milk containers, go into recycling.

- Compostables: All "green" waste from the garden. Any branches larger than 2" in diameter must be bundled and put beside the cart. If you're taking down a tree and will have anything really big, you need to call them first so they know. Green leafy branches, btw, are welcomed by the city zoo, and most gardening services will drop them off for you.

All food waste, including fat and bones, also get composted. If I think it will smell (warm weather + too many days before p/u) I'll refrigerate or freeze it. I have a stainless bowl on my counter lined with newspaper. All trimmings and parings go into it, as well as coffee grounds and filters, eggshells and cartons, etc. Any paper take-out food containers are also compostable, such as pizza boxes, take-out coffee cups, paper plates, paper towels/napkins.

There are two items we recycle that are not part of the weekly pick-up:

- Plastic bags. All markets are required by law to have a recycling wastebin for people to drop off plastic bags. Plastic bags are also banned in many cities now; only food take-out chains are still allowed to use them, on gradual phase-out.

- Styrofoam peanuts. We hate these, but we do a lot of mail-order and still receive them from some companies - fewer and fewer, thankfully. I can see the use for molded styrofoam; some stuff just needs that level of shipping protection! But the days of a company shipping me a shoe order in a box packed full of styrofoam peanuts seems finally gone. They go into a 13-gall trash bag, and when the bag is full we drop it off at one of our local UPS stores where they are happy to take it and re-use it.

So....no trash compactor for us. Ever. I don't know a single person that has one in our social circle, from multi-million dollar homes to rental studios, nor that wants one. Never even seen it mentioned in a RE ad over the last 20 yrs.

Wow, I wish we could recycle as much as you can, jakkom. Our NO list of things you can't recycle is actually longer than the YES list. We still recycle, compost, or re-use as much as possible to limit waste from our house. I can't imagine what all I would use a trash compactor for. Our garbage can is rarely more than half-full as it is. And we have the smallest possible can provided by our service.