GARDEN CITY, Idaho — The inability to shop at local grocery stores and fulfill a zero-waste effort frustrated Lea Rainey and her husband; they opened Roots - a zero waste market in Garden City - as a response in 2019.

"It feels good," Rainey said.

They're an environmentally conscious couple that lost faith in the latter end of the core principals - reduce, reuse, recycle. A 2022 Bennington College study - reported by NPR - suggested less than 5% of recycled plastic in the United States are actually repurposed into a new product. The study concluded up to 84% of recycled plastic end up in a landfill.