New Service Digitizes CDs, Recycles Cases

New online music marketplace Murfie lets you buy, sell and store CDs, while the company recycles the jewel cases for you. Photo: Flickr/Kim Scarborough

Now that your music collection has gone digital, what do you do with all those old CDs and their jewel cases?

Murfie, a new online music marketplace, wants to help, allowing members to buy, sell and store their CDs, while the company recycles the jewel cases – a material with limited local recycling options.

How does it work? Mail in your CDs to Murfie’s headquarters in Madison, Wis., where the company uses commercial-quality equipment to convert the music files into the digital format of your choice, including MP3, FLAC, Apple Lossless and AAC. For a download fee of $1 per CD, you can listen to your music on all your computers and music players.

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Murfie stores your CDs in its warehouse, so you can retain ownership of your CD collection without cluttering your home. Storage is free for up to 1,000 CDs for one year; after one year, Murfie charges $12 for storage unless you make at least 10 annual sales, purchases or trades.

Once your CDs are digitized and safely stored in Murfie’s warehouse, the company ships the plastic #6 polystyrene jewel cases to a local Waste Management facility for recycling. Murfie told the New York Times that it aims to recycle 100 tons of plastic in its first year of operation.

Murfie’s commitment to recycling is so strong that its founders named the company after the acronym for a materials recovery facility, or recycling sorting facility – MRF, pronounced, “murf.”

Why buy and store CDs in this age of downloading digital music from Amazon and iTunes? Buying music files from these online stores only provides the license to listen to the music, while purchasing CDs guarantees the legal rights to sell, trade and convert into new audio file formats, according to Murfie’s website.