Dumpster

A dumpster is a large steel waste container for garbage or construction waste designed to be brought and taken away by a special truck or to be emptied into a garbage truck. The word is a genericized trademark of Dumpster, an American brand name for a type of mobile garbage bin. Generic usage of dumpster is also common in Australia, although Dumpster is not an established brand there.

History

The word "dumpster", first used commercially in 1936, came from the Dempster-Dumpster system of mechanically loading the contents of standardized containers onto garbage trucks, which was patented by Dempster Brothers in 1935. The containers were called Dumpsters, a portmanteau of the company's name with the word dump. The Dempster Dumpmaster, which became the first successful front-loading garbage truck that used this system, to popularized the word.

The word dumpster has had at least three trademarks associated with it by Dempster Brothers, but today it is often used as a genericized trademark.