From trash to fashion: Michigan businesses find big bucks in recycled products

Whenever they can’t use a piece of wood for a bag, perhaps because it wasn’t flexible enough, they use it for other items.

“We make medallions and rings and earrings,” said employee Joyce Berry, as she sat at her workstation on a recent morning. “What we can’t use for a purse, we salvage for other things."

In Muskegon, Oshki makes performance apparel out of plastic waste. Shirts are made from recycled plastic bottles. Hats incorporate recycled cotton. For example, there’s the Michitrout Performance long-sleeve men's shirt made of 100% U.S.-based plastics, said Jackson Riegler, founder of Oshki.

“It's like equivalent to around 16 bottles worth of plastic into one shirt, and it's made purely out of that recycled material,” he said.

Riegler said Oshki works with Trout Unlimited and donates 5% of profits from that shirt to Michigan-based chapters of the organization, which focuses on trout conservation and preservation.

The fabric is 100% made in the United States, while the cut and sew work is done in Colombia. Riegler said they are in talks with the Industrial Sewing and Innovation Center in Detroit to help localize the production of new products.

“That's a big goal of ours moving forward," Riegler said. "You kind of have to walk the line in between sourcing in the U.S. and also making it an affordable product to the consumer.”

Oshki’s long-sleeve performance shirts are $42, the hoodie is $50 and the Solar Fly Hoodie is $50. The Essential Trucker hat is $28.

Riegler said he started Oshki as a high school senior in 2017, selling shirts to raise funds for nonprofits working to preserve the Great Lakes. He was inspired to grow the business as a student at the University of Michigan. He shifted to using recycled plastics for the shirts.

Oshki works with a North Carolina producer that turns plastics into yarn and a portion of those plastics come from the Great Lakes cleanups.

“My ultimate goal is to do a completely closed-loop supply chain, where whatever content that we use is directly from our general cleanup efforts,” he said.

He wasn’t sure if he would continue the work after college, but the partnership with Trout Unlimited has provided him the ability to continue. It's also benefited the nonprofit, which Riegler said has received $350,000 from shirt sales.

Oshki plans to soon roll out a women’s version of the Michitrout Performance long-sleeve shirt.

A uniform process

Old military clothing is finding a new life in White Lake Township. Amy Coffee of Coffee Upcycle LLC makes small, medium and large bags out of military uniforms.

Seven years ago, she looked at a military fatigue jacket that belonged to her husband, Brad, who is an Air Force veteran. Coffee, a nurse, thought the material would make a good work bag.

“I made one, took it to work and then all of a sudden everybody was seeing it, and they wanted me to make one from their loved ones’ uniforms. That’s kind of how I fell into it.”

Coffee gets the liner fabric from thrift stores, consignment shops and dumpsters. “We accept donations, I dumpster-dive and find a lot of old military products, cut them all apart,” Coffee said. “The materials I use are all authentic.”

Prices range from about $55 for a 5-by-7-inch bag to $185 for a more intricate and embellished bag. Coffee said she’s also sown bags from old blankets and comforters.

“Anybody can go to a shop and buy something, but where did it come from?” she said. “What was the history of it beforehand? You know, recycled products have such wonderful patinas to them.”

O’Brien, with the Michigan Recycling Coalition, said it can sometimes be a challenge for businesses to find materials for their products.

“I think the sourcing of materials is always kind of the biggest thing when you're wanting to make something, and so ensuring that you have that robust supply,” she said.

When Pingree Detroit is done with the materials it will use for its products, it passes the rest along to other creators so that none of it goes to waste.

“We donate materials now that we can’t use,” Schlaff said. The majority of the recipients “are women of color who will make everything from earrings, bracelets to their own bags. They can utilize materials we can't use. Anything that's left over after that, we actually shred. We work with another partner, and the shred becomes fill for punching bags and it's used for other products.”

Monique Whitley, owner of Detroit-based Raggedy Bags, is among those businesses that have received upcycled leather from Pingree Detroit. She uses the leather and denim in her designs.

“I was totally like a kid in a candy store,” said Whitley, recalling the first time she received some leather from Schlaff. “I started making the stuff, and I showed him everything I made with it, and I’ve just been so excited. Yeah, it's been great.”

Whitley began making bags more than a dozen years ago when she couldn’t find one she liked. She designed and created a multi-colored cloth bag for herself.

“Somebody commented on my strap and how cute my bag was, and I said, ‘This raggedy thing?’” she said. “And that's where I'm like, You know what? Raggedy bags. There we go. And that's it.”

Whitley sells her one-of-a-kind bags weekly at Eastern Market. Her prices range from $5 for a wristlet to $200 for a large leather bag.

In addition to scrap leather, Whitley makes bags using denim from blue jeans donated to her or from thrift stores. She says about half of the materials she uses in her bags have been repurposed.

“Where you see people just cutting the denim, I have to literally because of waste, I have to literally take it apart seam by seam. It's also therapy for me, too.”