Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park goes solo

Mike Shinoda, who is popularly known for being part of the band Linkin Park, is taking on a new project, solo. Stepping away from the world of art and entertainment, Shinoda is one of the owners of a new recycling company in Haiti called Sustainable Recycling Solutions. As part owner, the investment comes from his personal pocket, not the bands. He and his business partners turned a $300,000 (RM 929,549.76) investment into a business that generated sales in the first year of $560,000 (RM 1.7 million ) and projects over $1 million (RM 3 million) in year two. The recording artist recently returned from the poverty stricken country - he visited during the three-year anniversary of the devastating earthquake. Shinoda had kept the project secret, waiting to make sure it would be a success. A big challenge for Shinoda was trying draw attention to this new business. "Linkin Park is not a popular band in Haiti, first of all, so almost everybody that I spoke to when we went down there, they don't really know about the band," he said. "It's not until you say something like, 'We've sold as many records as like I don't know, like Jay-z or Rihanna. Then they go, okay now I get it. Wow, really? Where? Clearly not in Haiti (laughs), right? So why talk about it? Well right now I think that there is a moment where following after what happened with Hurricane Sandy people in the U.S. think about hurricane Sandy hitting the east coast, they don't realize that once again like it went through Haiti and it just devastated the place. They were not set up for this. They are still trying to build back from the earthquake and then this hurricane comes and just ravishes the country." The idea to start this new business came from one of Shinoda's old childhood friends. With unemployment in Haiti at over 75%, it was clear this should be built as a business and not a non-profit. "A childhood friend of mine worked for a charity that has been operating in Haiti for a while and he came to me when he came home to L.A. we were just having dinner and stuff and he was explaining to me how it looks over there and how this plastic and garbage is piling up everywhere," explained Shinoda. "Not only is it a health hazard, but they were starting to have a really big cholera problem and this was adding to that. Haiti doesn't have a recycling program so he said, I am thinking of having a recycling company down there. I got really interested in that and we talked it out and we thought about it in conversation about it being a non-profit but then we realized the people there, it seems like a regular for profit business is just going to benefit them more. They want that pride of having a job and making money and not just getting hand-outs. So that was the start of the company that I am one of the owners of, which is called SRS. SRS is operating out of Port-Au-Prince, Haiti and this year we've collected over three and a half million pounds of plastic already." "SRS which stands for Sustainable Recycling Solutions began a little over one year ago and at that time it was just me and three partners, one of which is a Haitian gentleman who lives in Port-Au-Prince," continued Shinoda. "We had a dirt lot. They don't provide, there's no electricity grid. There's no running water. There is literally just dirt on the ground and nothing else and from that we built a company that employees 30 people full-time. We have over 4,000 collectors. We operate in Port-Au-Prince and other cities as far away as people are willing to drive to get to Port-Au-Prince to drop this stuff off. We've collected over three and a half million pounds of plastic in one year." While Shinoda points out that he will be as involved as need be, the company has hit a point where it's self-run. Shinoda hopes that someday this will close the recycling loop in Haiti and fully process the bottles on-site into clean resin that can be re-sold to Haitian manufactures making clothes and textiles. While, his heart goes out to the hard life Haitians endure, Shinoda clarifies they hold a very special place in his heart. "At the same time, I've seen this wonderful spirit of people who like, they are hard workers," said Shinoda. "Despite the fact they are facing this unemployment rate and things are rough, they are so rough that people in the U.S. can't possibly imagine. It's definitely harder than anything you have ever seen or I have ever seen here in the states."