Busey Bank Case Study

Headquartered in Champaign, Illinois, Busey Bank first opened its doors in 1868 and today has 58 locations across Illinois, Missouri, Florida, and Indiana. Forbes magazine named Busey one of America's Best Banks for 2022, ranking it number 52 overall and the top-ranked bank headquartered in Illinois.

The IT team at Busey Bank wasn't originally looking for the most sustainable option when they discovered Cisco Refresh—they just needed equipment, fast.

Upon learning that they could get certified remanufactured products directly from Cisco sooner than they could get the new products they were waiting on, Busey ordered a number of Cisco 1000 Series Integrated Services Routers (ISRs) and small form-factor pluggables (SFPs) from Cisco Refresh. And not only did they find what they needed—they discovered a new channel for reaching their sustainability goals. Remanufactured equipment uses less raw material than new and keeps e-waste out of landfills.

Today, Busey looks for Refresh product first—rather than as a backup. "It's our preferred option now," said Vice President and Operations Manager Luke Wurl. "I'm on board from a sustainability perspective. We're committing to as little net new equipment as possible."

And this is truly consistent with Busey's longstanding approach to environmental sustainability. "We're always looking at all of our equipment and e-waste and trying to see how we can approach it from a lifecycle perspective," says Wurl.

For years, that has meant donating their end-of-service hardware to students at the local community college. "We're fortunate in that we do have a community college that offers a two-year network administration program. We get it into those students' hands who want to build a home lab and get their CCNA certification," adds Wurl. "To get this into the hands of people who want to learn feels great."

Busey will now supplement their ongoing donations with Cisco's Takeback and Reuse program. Available through a web platform and an app, the program allows equipment owners to return hardware that has reached end-of-use at no cost. They simply take a picture of the products they wish to dispose of, and Cisco retrieves them for either remanufacturing or recycling. "This will be perfect for the 700 phones, for instance, that I've just taken out of commission. The students don't want those, but Cisco says 'Hey—we're going to take these off your hands,' and I don't have to worry about it. This takes the burden off me to find an e-recycler, and there's a dollar value in that. I get all that time back to focus on my main responsibilities."