Ep. 68: Fabscrap’s service aims to end commercial ‘waste’ Ankit Podcast

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Ep. 68: Fabscrap’s service aims to end commercial ‘waste’

This week’s guest on The WTiN Podcast is Jessica Schreiber, founder and CEO of Fabscrap.

Speaker 1: WTiN
Speaker 2: Jessica Schreiber

Speaker 1
Hello, my name is Jessica Owen, and I'm the Deputy digital editor at WTiN. And this is the WTiN podcast. Join me and my guests every week as we talk about new and interesting innovations from across the textile and apparel industry. Whether it's talking to sustainable startups quizzing experts on the latest research and development, or chatting to companies about their most recent products, you can rest assured that the WTiN podcast will connect you with everything you need to know. This week, I am joined by Jessica Schreiber, who is the founder and CEO of FAB scrap, a collection recycling and reuse service based in New York City that aims to end commercial waste. Jessica talks about how the service operates how brands have access to their diversion metrics for say, their marketing or CSR initiatives, and how she plans to expand the service to Philadelphia and Los Angeles in the near future. Hello, Jessica, welcome to the WTiN podcast, thank you so much for joining me today. How are you?

Speaker 2
I'm good. Thanks. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1
Oh, you're very welcome. I mean, we just we just said off the phone that you're based in New York, right. So it's a bit early start over there. 

Speaker 2
Right in early. Yes. I'm in our Brooklyn warehouse. 

Speaker 1
Right. And how is the situation over there regarding Coronavirus? If you don't mind me asking. 

Speaker 2
I feel like we can see a light at the end of the tunnel. Almost everyone I know has been vaccinated. The city's announcing some Reopenings. So we're cautiously optimistic here.

Speaker 1
Right. Well, I mean, that sounds brilliant. I haven't been vaccinated over here yet. I think it will be summer. I don't know. Maybe June, July. But yeah, that's really great news. I think I was speaking to someone from New York this time last year. And she was like, oh, it's awful. The streets. There's no one in the streets. And it was just terrible. So yeah, that's really encouraging.

Speaker 2
Yeah, huge improvement from this time last year. Yeah,

Speaker 1
sounds it? Well, I mean, today, then we're going to be talking all about your company called fab scrap, which is based in New York, which is known as a one stop textile reuse and recycling resource. So do you mind just firstly telling me what you mean by that? Exactly. I mean, what do you do as a company? 

Speaker 2
Yeah, um, fab scrap is unique as a company, because while there's a lot of nonprofits that collect, use clothing, and use home goods, we really work with businesses. So we work with fashion industry, interior design, industry, entertainment industry, and we're collecting all the excess or unwanted materials that get wasted when making products. And so we're like a thrift store for raw materials. We collect fabric, leather skins, cones of yarn by introns, trim zippers, and make them available so that they don't go to landfill. And so the students, artists, crafters creators have this sustainable resource to choose from. Right.

Speaker 1
Okay. And so why, I mean, when did you actually start the business, then? I mean, what was what was your background beforehand? And why did you think it was necessary?

Speaker 2
My, my background prior to, was still in waste. I was working at New York City's Department of Sanitation, in their bureau of recycling and sustainability. And I was there for about five years, and I was overseeing the city's clothing and E waste recycling programmes. And so that's where I got a really good idea of the nonprofit network and infrastructure for used goods really learned a lot about volume and collections. And in that role, brands started to reach out to the department to ask what they could do with their leftover textiles. And it didn't really fit into any of the existing programmes. But there were about 30 brands that reached out to me. So it seemed like a problem in the industry that could be addressed. And even though it was really niche, I thought I could maybe be the one to address it. And so that's kind of where fabs graph got started.

Speaker 1
Right? So you were well positioned then to do this. That sounds great. And now that when I looked on your website, there was some information on there actually, about the residential versus the commercial waste streams and everything. And I think I read a statistic that is like, Oh, well, residents themselves throw out something like 200,000 tonnes of clothing, but the commercial side is like so much more than that. So I mean, are you able to sort of paint a picture of the amount of places that's there. 

Speaker 2
I mean, that's, that's really hard. And that's one of the things that was sort of most shocking to me during my time at sanitation is that, as a city department, we were measuring everything. I was even part of waste characterization studies where we were ripping open bags of New York City trash and sorting it into 180 different categories, because we wanted to know, like, what are New Yorkers throwing away? And how much are they throwing away? What was what was so shocking to me was that there's not that type of transparency or research or study happening for commercial waste. And so when I was looking for numbers about commercial textile waste, it was impossible to find. And there's lots of different reasons for that it's private companies who are working with private waste haulers. And so there's just not a lot of reporting requirements unless something is like specifically hazardous. But it was really hard to find out what businesses throw away and how often and how much. And so that was one of the things that I wanted to address with Fab scrap was start to like, paint a picture of what do fashion companies throw away and what sort of textiles are heading to landfill? The best estimate that I could find comes from the Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard. And it's for every pound that we throw away as a consumer, the business likely created 40 pounds of waste upstream, which means that for I mean, every 200,000 tonnes that we throw away in New York City that are textiles, there's potentially 40 times more on the commercial end. So I think that's a really important piece of what we're doing is just trying to draw attention to commercial waste and what an impact it has, and that it needs to be regulated and recycled the same way as residential. 

Speaker 1
Yeah. And I mean, you're just talking about New York City there. If you were to scale that up for all everywhere in the world, that's a hell of a lot of waste. Isn't it? Really, right.

Speaker 2
That's just New York City. And that's still every single year 200,000 tonnes. So it's not like that's, that's over some amount of time, it's a really short time period to be creating that much waste. 

Speaker 1
Yeah, it's a bit scary, really, when you put it like that. So you came up with this idea for fab scrap, then to meet this need? So do you mind telling me a bit about how your service works, then? I mean, where does everything begin? 

Speaker 2
Sure. Um, so our service really begins with the companies that we work with. And I just want to note there, it's almost never like C suite that saying, like, our company recycles textiles. Now, more often, it's someone like on a design team, or on a fabric team, who realises how much is heading to landfill and sort of wants to intervene and recycle or reuse it. And so we'll get an email, just asking some questions about service, we'll follow up answering questions describing service with the service agreement. And then essentially what we do is send out large reusable laundry bags. And we have the brands that we work with fill those bags with anything that they no longer want or need. So about 70% of what we pick up are like fabric swatches and cuttings will get mutilated, and mock up garments from the sampling process. Like I said, cones of yarn button zippers, trims, all of that goes into the fab scrap bags. And then we'll also pick up full rolls of fabric. When the bags are full, and the rolls are ready, they just request pickup online, we come by and pick it up and leave them with empty bags so that they can keep collecting. And what's unique there is that we even though we're a nonprofit, we have a service fee. And that was really intentional, because I wanted companies to have the effect of their waste in their bottom line and to be helping, like fund the infrastructure that was needed to recycle the material. So there's a service fee for pickup unless it's full rolls of fabric those we pick up for free. And those are a donation because we're usually able to resell or reuse them. And so that's sort of where we work is the service to pick up everything from the industry and then redistribute it as like a fabric thrift store, to anyone who's looking for sustainable materials for their creative work in between the service fees and fabric sales. Were pretty self sustaining, and then just do fundraising for big moments of growth, like when we opened our shop in Manhattan.

Speaker 1
Right, but I'll come on to that in a second. But from what I understand there, you also have a big network of volunteers who sort of sought out all this waste that you collected. Is that right? 

Speaker 2
Yeah. So we're picking up anywhere from like 5000 to 10,000 pounds a week. And that's a lot of material to go through. And so we have volunteers, we have volunteers sessions every day, people sign up, it's a three hour session, you're really just helping us sort material for what could be reused versus what could be recycled. And as a thank you, we let volunteers leave with five pounds of fabric for free. So it's a really great way to learn about fabric, you get a little bit of trend forecasting, because you're seeing what all of these New York City designers were sampling. And then you get to leave with some free fabrics. So it's a really sort of cool way to give back but learn a lot and take some fabric home for students and artists.

Speaker 1
So is that the people who usually volunteer then students and artists,

Speaker 2
I mean, I'm, I'm always shocked by the diversity that we see in our volunteers. And why people are interested in volunteering, a lot of people starting their own lines, there's a lot of people who are just interested in waste. Sometimes people need volunteer hours for Girl Scouts or for a class project. And so it really like we've had anyone and everyone volunteer, it's great.

Speaker 1
Yay, sounds I mean, I wish I lived in New York, I'd be well up for doing that. So how did you sort the fabric centre? Think what did you say was to do with polyester, cotton and wool? Are those the three main streams? And I mean, do you ever have trouble with these people? Maybe sorting them incorrectly or so

Speaker 2
the sorting process is really at its like most basic levels? Like can we recycle this or can we reuse this? And so recycling for us really means more like down cycling, what we're doing is shredding the fabric and it becomes this sort of low grade fibre pulp called shoddy and shoddy is used in insulation, carpet padding, mattress stuffing. And the only limitations there are that we can't shred spandex or leather. And spandex includes like elastic elastic and lycra. So the first thing that we're doing is, is it big enough to reuse Great, we'll put it immediately out so that it's shoppable and reusable. If it's not big enough to reuse, does it have spandex and if not, then most likely it will get shredded. If it does, then we'll save it. And there we're working with like boxing gyms and pet shelters, to sort of move it in bulk. But that's also free for anyone to take home. We are sorting 100%, cotton, poly and wool. Even though right now it's still getting shredded, because I've seen some development of fibre to fibre recycling technology for those fibres, meaning not just shredding it, and it becomes insulation or carpet padding, but it could become fabric again. And that's really exciting. They're not quite ready to take volume yet. So we sort it so that we have those measurements so that when they're ready to take volume, I know I can send you 500 pounds a week and we can start to work with them when they're ready. 

Speaker 1
We'll all the companies that you've seen in fibres fibre recycling, I know a couple of places in Europe, but I mean, what exactly have you seen that's out there already?

Speaker 2
For cotton, there's ever new for cotton poly blends, worn again, which I think is in the UK. There's a couple for specifically nylon, and specifically polyester. But it's definitely it's definitely like a interesting field and space right now to be working in. A lot of those companies I think are really focused on post consumer which is, which is definitely harder to sort. You could ask like, what happens if somebody doesn't know what the fabric is. Most of what we get are fabric samples and swatches from Mills. And they come on like cardboard headers or stapled to pieces of paper. And what's great about that is that it contains all of the information about the fabric, so it will tell us the fibre type, it'll tell us all of the different colorways the cost per yard, the mill information, etc. And so from that, you don't have to know anything about fabric to volunteer because almost everything you're sorting is labelled. 

Speaker 1
Yeah, that makes it so much easier for people. And what about chemical recycling? Is that something you would ever consider as well? Have you seen any sort of innovation there? So I

Speaker 2
haven't I haven't looked into it enough. But I think whether mechanical or chemical chemical, like we're pretty open to anything that could extend the life of the fibres or generate new material.

Speaker 1
Now, earlier you mentioned that you've actually set up a shop which sounds really interesting because well, when I first looked at your website, I assumed that it was sort of like a maybe a business to business kind of thing, but actually anyone can come along to your shop and buy secondhand fat Break. So is that pretty much how it works?

Speaker 2
Yeah, for our recycling service, that's very b2b. And we're working at pretty high volumes there. But a lot of what we're picking up is like low quantities, but super high quality, because we're working with these great brands in New York City. And so our fabric sales are much more b2c, we have a shop where you can come in and look through all of the material, we have our warehouse, where you can actually purchase material by the pound, so almost like wholesale pricing, and then our online store as well. If we do get higher volumes of, of material where where we would be able to fill multiple orders, then we'll put it up online, so that it's accessible beyond New York City. So yeah, we're definitely working at two different scales. Very be to be on the service side. But we're working mostly with individuals or like new designers, costume designers, artists, on the fabric sales side, right?

Speaker 1
I say, Well, I mean, this is such a great idea in terms of sustainability circularity, but um, it's also such a great opportunity, actually, for students, artists, start up companies, because I'm assuming then you could be collecting, say, Ralph Lorenz, you know, used material, and someone's probably picking it up in your shop for like, you know, quite cheaply, and they would never have had access to that otherwise. 

Speaker 2
Exactly. Yeah. That I think is the amazing part of sort of the redistribution that we're able to do is all of these materials are so publicly available. And brands are willing to do that, because it's totally anonymous. Once we pick it up, it's fab scrap fabric will never, like point back to its original source. So brands are willing to give us a lot to resell. And then for customers, rather than going like design office to design office and asking about excess, they can find the excess material of 500 brands in one in one spot.

Speaker 1
And I mean, do you know I mean, I know you're a nonprofit, but is there any other company or organisation in the city or elsewhere in America, doing what you're doing, for example,

Speaker 2
not in the same way, there's sort of in an industry in the garment district. They're called jobbers. And in that way, brands will sort of sell it discount their excess to jobbers who will then resell it. And so it's a way for brands to kind of recoup some of those costs. And we we say like, if you can sell your excess, you should sell your excess. But the small swatches and like smaller pieces usually are not things that they can resell, and sometimes jobbers don't want certain fabrics. And so if they can't resell it, then we're an option to keep it out of landfill.

Speaker 1
And I saw on your website that you've done like an impact assessment, I think for for last year now. Are you able to tell me about some of the savings and the impact that fab scrap model actually does have on the industry and waste? 

Speaker 2
Sure. That's exciting. I love getting into the data. We measure everything as it comes in. This is probably from my time at sanitation. We measure everything as it comes in. And we measure everything as it's sorted by brand. And so at the end of every year, we send an impact report to every single one of our clients with their individual diversion metrics. And then at the bottom of that she is fab scraps, overall metrics. And we show the total picked up and where it went, what percentage was reused, what percentage was recycled, if anything went to landfill and why. And then we try and make it usable for them and their own sort of CSR process. And so we are using a report. It's a little dated now. But we're using a report that did have some conversion for pre consumer waste to co2. So we try and give brands their co2 savings by working with us and diverting their material. And then using the EPA, we're able to also say that co2 savings is the equivalent of planting X number of trees. And we really want companies to kind of like envision their impact in a in a tangible way. And so we provide that data for them. We are nearing I think if we don't pass it this month, it'll be next 750,000 pounds saved from landfill. 

Speaker 1
Gosh, right. And so will you be doing this every single year and I'm assuming you're hoping that that amount will continue to increase? 

Speaker 2
Yeah, we we've done it every year. It's part of the service that the brands pay for this year and really excited will roll out an online profile where brands can log in and see their diversion metrics and And co2 savings in real time. So I'm excited for that. And they'll be able to request pickup and pay invoices all in one place. And that hopefully, because everything will be live online, will save us the need from creating the PDFs that I've been making every year, because it's a very long process.

Speaker 1
Right. Okay. And I mean, do companies ever have any sort of queries about what you do? Is there anything that they see as a barrier, which means that they might not get involved with Fab scrap? Or actually, is it just something that you know, everyone's excited about?

Speaker 2
I think when we started, we're in our fifth year now. And so it's a little bit more mainstream. But when we started, there were a lot of companies that didn't understand why they should pay for recycling service. And I really tried to explain that the same way that the company pays for paper recycling, or metal, glass and plastic recycling, this is a textile recycling service, most of what we pick up is not reusable. And so we definitely have to be able to cover our cost to sort it to shred it. So sometimes, there's a little bit of sticker shock, I guess, because recycling costs more than landfill. But we really try and provide something that's super convenient, really transparent. And so I do think there's a lot of value there, particularly as brands start to market their sustainability initiatives. The other thing that came up sometimes was, some brands don't want anything resold or reused. And so we had to make sure that we had a way to handle proprietary material. So we actually have a whole separate stream, a separate warehouse space fab scrap hired sorters, who are working through proprietary material, and that skips reuse entirely and will only be shredded. And so it's really helping those brands, save material from landfill because the alternative before fab scrap was incineration. And so that proprietary concern did come up a lot. And so we've been working with that.

Speaker 1
That's really interesting, actually, because you pay for these companies products, because they are unique, aren't they they're not found on the high street. So you can understand that they wouldn't want their material being used elsewhere, because it may devalue what they've created. So the fact that you've, you know, provided a solution for them there. I mean, they've got no excuse not to, to join it. Really. 

Speaker 2
Yeah, I mean, we're hoping to provide an alternative that is a little bit more responsible. And I've been, I've just been so interested to see the type of material that comes through our proprietary stream, things like slogans that got printed on a t shirt that maybe weren't appropriate. And I'm glad they didn't get put on shelves, and they got pulled and destroyed with us. Celebrity collaborations where there was a bunch of merch made, but then the collaboration fell through and didn't go public. So yeah, there's definitely some times where like brands don't want to donate. And so to kind of see the material as it comes through has been really interesting. 

Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah, I can imagine. Well, I mean, we're talking about companies now. And on your website, you list all the people that you work with. So there's, I think PVH Marc Jacobs. And the collaboration which drew my eye to your company was most recently was the one with Urban Outfitters. So are you able to talk about any of these partnerships and the feedback that they've provided you with so far? I mean, how have they experienced the whole, you know, system? 

Speaker 2
Yeah, I'm one of the first things that I heard, even in the first year to from from some of our very first clients was that fab scrap was a really great employee engagement programme, because so many people recycle at home or compost at home, but then they come to work and feel like their workplace isn't doing as much. And so to see sort of the company also taking steps to recycle was a really good like employee engagement tool. So I thought that was really interesting. From urban, they're one of the first companies that we sort of piloted shipping with because they're not local to New York, but really wanted to participate. Their headquarters are in Philadelphia. And so they were one of the first companies that we started shipping with and so that's been really interesting to kind of work out that logistically and get a get a heads up of what's coming and understand the we're sort of still looking through some of the like environmental impact scope of shipping versus pickup, etc. But they've been I'm really happy with sort of the impact and diversion. And so the larger partnership is coming from wanting to expand fab scraps reach and availability, I think they took a great leadership role in sort of investing in a location in Philadelphia, not just so that they can use it more conveniently. But it brings the fabric resource to everyone in Philadelphia, potentially, Baltimore, in DC. And it also means that all of the other brands that have headquarters and production in that region, now also have more access to the service. So I'm excited to see more companies get involved, there's other cities that we would love to expand to. And I think it shows that the industry sees the value in in this infrastructure as there's going to be a bigger push for sustainability and potentially policy in the future.

Speaker 1
Yeah, definitely. Well, that was gonna be one of my questions, actually, whether you'd ever consider branching out into different cities or even, you know, different continents, I'm sure Europe would love to have a system like this. So the company is able to grow then with the increasing demand for your surface. 

Speaker 2
Yeah, I mean, it's, there's definitely much more demand. And so, for us, it's always been a challenge of scaling sustainably, to meet that demand. And so we there's definitely moments where it's like, oh, we have way too much material here. And we kind of have to shift and reorganise. So there's, there's always demand, the waste never stops, I would be happy to open in more cities. And then internationally, I think we should probably consider franchising, I think it would be much easier for somebody who knows their local industry knows the local creative network, to set up a similar model. And what's most important to me is just that the data is tracked, and the transparency and the information that we're recording and sharing is accurate. And so as long as it's all sort of contained. In that way. I think somebody who knows their their local industry is going to be most successful at making it work.

Speaker 1
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And as you grow, you could get scared of losing that control. So I completely understand where you're coming from there. So on that note, then, I mean, what are your immediate plans for the future? I mean, what what are you hoping to achieve maybe this year and next year,

Speaker 2
so this year, I think the big, the big project will be opening our doors in Philadelphia, and starting service more along the northeast region. So I'm really excited for that. We're hoping to open this fall. Next year, I think we'll be returning to our plans to open in LA, at the beginning of 2020. January in February, my co founder and I were in LA, we were looking at warehouses, we were interviewing people almost ready to sign a lease. And then and then COVID. So I think we're both we're both excited to learn a lot from opening a second location, so close to home, and then take everything that we learned and return to those plans that we had for LA and hopefully, next year sometime. We're moving forward with an LA location. 

Speaker 1
Well, that sounds very exciting. I mean, I understand that LA is one of probably the most sustainably minded states in the US. And I mean, you've got so many brands and designers out there that I imagine. Yeah, the opportunities are endless. Really. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2
I'm excited to see where it goes and the growth of our online store so that more people have access to the material is exciting to

Speaker 1
Finally then if there is any company or anyone listening to these podcasts who is interested in what you do, I mean, how can they get involved? How should they contact you? 

Speaker 2
Oh, um, so many ways to get involved. For service, there is a interest forum on our website, fab scrap that org slash contact, there's a button right at the top that says I have scraps to recycle. You can fill that in with your company information and we'll get back to you. If you want to volunteer fab scrap.org/volunteer And we have sessions every day. We'd love to have people come and help out. We could definitely use the help and have so much fabric to send home with you for free. We are looking to feature textile artists and creatives and educators we do a Digital Workshop every other week. So that an artists can Skill Share with our community ways to creatively reuse the fabric. So if you want to teach a Digital Workshop, we're always looking for people and if you want to learn something new digital workshops are free every other week. And then yeah, check out our online store and our Instagram, which is fab underscore scrap. We do special flash sales once a week on our Instagram too. 

Speaker 1
Wow. All right, brilliant. I mean, there's so many opportunities there, as you say, like anyone can get involved. So that's great. Well, I mean, Jessica has been lovely speaking with you stay but I think that's all we've got time for. But I mean, good luck with all of your plans for LA for Philadelphia and you must let me know how you get on with everything. Thank you. 

Speaker 2
Yeah. Thank you so much.