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Uniqlo announced Wednesday its partnership with Piece of Cake Moving and Storage and SuperCircle for its “UNtrash It” initiative for Earth Month to allow customers to give their unwanted clothes a second life.
The initiative was created by Uniqlo to prevent clothes from ending up in landfills. Notably, 92 million tons of clothing waste are generated every year. And often, many people also end up keeping their closets full to the brim with old and unworn clothes because they don’t have an easily accessible way to part with them.
To solve this problem, the trio has teamed up to create a way for customers to recycle their clothes while moving, decluttering and making space. With Piece of Cake Moving’s logistics, Uniqlo’s in-store collection program Re.Uniqlo and SuperCircle’s advanced textile sorting and recycling infrastructure, the program is fully funded for Earth Month to ensure that the clothes sent are either donated or recycled for their next life.
When customers book a move with Piece of Cake Moving, customers will be given UNtrash It bags to collect unwanted clothing alongside their move. From there, the items will be put in the Re.Uniqlo program powered by SuperCircle to sort, donate, upcycle or recycle the garments.
Najah Ayoub, founding executive and chief marketing officer of Piece of Cake Moving and Storage, said this partnership with Uniqlo for its UNtrash It textile recycling program during Earth Month will allow customers to easily remove unwanted clothes the day of their move and give their clothes a new life.
“At Uniqlo, we believe that sustainability isn’t just about designing responsible products — it’s about taking complete responsibility for everything we sell, from creation to end-of-life,” Jean-Emmanuel Shein, global director of sustainability of Uniqlo, told WWD. “UNtrash It provides us with a great opportunity to not only highlight our Re.Uniqlo program, which we offer in all our stores, but also to make it easier than ever for consumers to responsibly dispose of their unwanted clothing during a stressful life event.”
For customers not moving, they can drop off their clothing at any Uniqlo store nationwide within their Re.Uniqlo bins, to be sorted and made into new products and materials or reused. Uniqlo said that as part of its company role, they have been making a long-term behavioral shift in creating circularity and making responsible clothing consumption part of the everyday norm.
Shein said m the UNtrash It program is aligned with hitting the company’s long-term sustainability goals with regard to “waste reduction, greenhouse gas reduction and social contribution.” He pointed out that the impact of changing customer behavior is where they see the most potential, by changing how people see clothes waste and making them more aware of Uniqlo’s worldwide clothing takeback program to manage the globe’s clothing carbon footprint.
“UNtrash It is designed to reframe that mindset,” Shein continued. “Once consumers understand that even that old, worn-out T-shirt has value and that there is an easy, free service that will preserve and extract that value, consumers will gradually change their behavior.”
Through company alignment with Piece of Cake Moving and SuperCircle — who he said shares in the Uniqlo ethos of innovation, sustainability and collaboration — the company said they believe in taking responsibility to manage the full lifecycle of their products.
The initiative was created as a free service to make the process for customers as easy as possible. Looking ahead, Shein said that a long-term model remains yet to be seen, but will be determined based on feedback from Uniqlo and Piece of Cake Moving and Storage customers. Moreover, Uniqlo’s UNtrash It initiative’s major focus is to ensure clothing recycling and accessibility is not just an Earth Month campaign; the company is also focusing its efforts with SuperCircle to expand their textile recycling.
Through the program, Uniqlo hopes to bring awareness to its customers as it remains one of their biggest challenges in creating a circular fashion model and educating their customers on how garments can have multiple lives.
“The UNtrash It initiative takes our years-long partnership with Re.Uniqlo to a new level by making it easier than ever for consumers to recycle and give their clothing a second life, right when they need it most. Together with Piece of Cake Moving and Storage, we’re turning what used to be a burden into an effortless, impactful action that keeps valuable textiles out of landfills and in circulation,” said Chloe Songer, cofounder and chief executive officer of SuperCircle.
