Queen City Commons
Photography Madeleine Hordinski
Cincinnati, Ohio — Queen City Commons is a residential and commercial food scrap collection service that makes composting more accessible in Greater Cincinnati. The company’s founder and owner, Marie Hopkins, started it in 2020 as a response to the city’s lack of an easy-to-access, centralized composting location.
Today, Queen City Commons is run by a small and mighty group of three: Hopkins, along with Julia Marchese and Kaelee Tobin. They partner with farms and gardens around the city (including Carriage House Farm and Tikkun Farm) that take the collected food scraps and turn them into compost that’s then used on the farm or garden site. There are 12 community drop-off bins around the city, spanning from Finneytown and Northside to Covington and Madeira, where people can sign up to take their food scraps to be composted. The drop-off service is priced on a sliding scale. The company also collects food scraps from local businesses like restaurants and coffee shops.
The trio wants to make composting even easier and more accessible, so they’re planning a pilot program this year to have more concentrated collection bins on almost every block in a neighborhood to make it easier for people to drop off their food scraps. “We’re hoping this is a pilot that could bring more people in,” Hopkins explains. “It’s a lot more accessible financially, and hopefully location-wise.”
“People want to do things for the planet,” Marchese says. “We’re witnessing so much chaos and tragedy, and composting is so tangible for people, and I think that’s also a message we try to get across: that you really are making a difference when you compost your food scraps.”
Find drop-off bins at: Redden Gardens (Covington), Church of the Redeemer (Hyde Park), Growing Trade (Northside), Redden Fine Meats & Seafood (Madeira), Flatiron Café (Mt. Auburn), and elsewhere. See all locations at the Queen City Commons website.
Kelsey Graham is a freelance writer with experience writing about food, restaurants, and the people behind the businesses. She graduated from the University of Cincinnati with a Master's in Professional Writing and a Bachelor's in Art History. As a loyal and enthusiastic Cincinnati transplant, she enjoys spending her free time exploring the city's thriving and ever-expanding food scene with her family whenever they get the chance.
