Campaign Set to Eliminate City’s 4,500 lbs. of Textile Waste
Sent to the Landfill Every Hour
San Francisco, CA – On Wednesday, January 15, the City and County of San Francisco will launch its Zero Waste Textile Initiative at Westfield San Francisco Centre to help reach the City’s goal of achieving zero waste by 2020. San Francisco annually sends more than 39 million pounds of textiles to the landfill—that is over 4,500 pounds each hour. Textiles are one of the top three materials that San Franciscans send to the landfill.
The new program—with the handle #SFSaveFashion—is not only expanding textile drop-off locations in San Francisco, but is also accepting worn out items that were previously considered trash. The event will also officially launch the first I:CO City Initiative—a government, nonprofit and private sector effort to prevent textile waste at the local level.
In an effort to encourage residents to reuse or recycle worn out sneakers and unwanted clothes instead of sending them to the landfill, the initiative provides an easy, convenient way to give unwanted textiles a second life.
Residents and businesses will be able to take their apparel, footwear, linens and other textiles to specially designed drop-off boxes at city locations and partner retailers for reuse or recycling. The program also includes expanded programs with nonprofit partners such as Goodwill and the Salvation Army.
- San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee
- Stephen Wiegand, I:Collect (I:CO) CEO
- Bridgett Luther, Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute President
- Maureen Sedonaen, SF Goodwill CEO
- Pierre Borjesson, H&M North America Senior Sustainability Specialist
- Adam Mott, The North FaceSenior Manager of Corporate Sustainability
- Helga Ying, American Eagle Outfitters VP External Engagement Social Responsibility
- Michael Kobori, Levi Strauss & Co Vice President of Sustainability
WHERE: Westfield San Francisco Centre / 845 Market St. entrancein San Francisco, Level 3, in front of Bloomingdales and H&M
VISUALS: New York Artist Derick Melander and local volunteers from the city and American Eagle Outfitters will construct a sculpture made of second hand clothing and textiles illustrating the more than 4,500 pounds of textiles sent to landfill in San Francisco each hour.
LANGUAGE: In language partner representatives will be available to conduct interviews in Spanish and Chinese.
Participating retail locations include: American Eagle Outfitters, Levi’s, The North Face, H&M, Puma, Forever21, Skunkfunk and many others.
San Francisco residents can learn more about the Zero Waste Textile Initiative at sfenvironment.org/textiles.