Gifts, homeware, and fashion retailer Oliver Bonas has announced a new recycling partnership with Re-Fashion.
The business announced the news yesterday (22 April), on World Earth Day, saying the new tie-up will help its customers recycle their no-longer-needed clothing.
Re-Fashion is an organisation that aims to reduce fashion’s impact on the environment. It resells unwanted clothes to raise money for sustainable causes and helps steer used garments away from landfill.
Indeed, the company also believes in “zero landfill”, and it creates rag bags for fashion students and the upcycling community with some of the recycled items it collects.
Oliver Bonas customers wanting to recycle clothing can request a free recycling bag with their online order. They then fill the bag with clothes in good condition from most high street brands, take it to their local Collect+ point, and the package is sent to Re-Fashion for free.
Re-Fashion will assess the items and class them as “good”, “OK”, or “not so good”. Depending on their condition, the clothes will be relisted for sale on the Re-Fashion website, sent to charity, or upcycled, respectively.
Rag bags are sold on the company’s Re-Make website, which is a marketplace for people to buy and sell upcycled clothing and accessories.
Re-Fashion has partnered with Rieves Foundation, one of the few charities that has a specific focus on sustainable fashion. The charity receives a minimum of 20% from every sale Re-Fashion makes.
According to Re-Fashion, it prefers high street fashion and designer brands, acknowledging it struggles to resell fast fashion labels such as Primark.
Women’s clothing of all sizes, including dresses, trousers, tops, bodysuits, sweaters, skirts, shorts, jeans, coats, jackets, sportswear, and activewear are all accepted. Shoes, bags and accessories, nightwear, underwear, men’s or kid’s fashion, or non-clothing items like children’s toys are not accepted.
Read more about take-back and recycling schemes on Green Retail World
[Image credit: Green Retail World]