You’ve heard it before: A family, leaves their homeland and comes to America seeking a new start, new opportunities, and the American Dream.

This is the Duong family’s story. The family escaped the Vietnam war and settled in San Francisco. The sixteen-member Duong family squeezed into two studio apartments.

David, the eldest of his siblings, adapted skills he learned about recycling from his parents, who owned the largest paper mill in South Vietnam. The family collected cardboard after school until midnight for several years and were able to purchase their first recycling warehouse in West Oakland

Under the leadership of siblings David (President & CEO), Kristina (CFO), and Victor (Vice President), the Duongs have established the largest recycling company in Northern California, employing over 300 union and non-union workers directly from the communities they serve.

Today, California Waste Solutions serves the Oakland and San Jose communities, and also has created an integrated waste management facility in their native Vietnam.

For the Duong family, this venture is about more than business. It’s about giving back to the communities that have given so much to them – even the home they were forced to leave more than forty years ago.

Honoring the memory of their parents, the Duong family invested over $150 million to create Vietnam Waste Solutions, the biggest waste treatment facility in Vietnam, managing solid waste collection, landfills, recycling and composting.