You Don't Have to Trash Old Undies, Recycle Them Instead!

In this episode, I sat down to chat with Amelia Trumble, the CEO and one of the co-founders of Retold Recycling, a super convenient solution to keep textiles out of landfills.

To learn more about Retold and purchase your bags, visit https://bit.ly/4aVKFcR

Transcript

Speaker 00: 0:00

Welcome to the GreenWife Happy Life Podcast, where I help you make simple swaps to keep your family healthy and the planet happy. In today's episode, I had the pleasure of chatting with Amelia Trumbull. She is the CEO and one of the co-founders of Retold Recycling. Retold was created out of Amelia's passion for finding a solution to the growing issue of unwanted textiles in our homes. Along with her two co-founders, she set out to build a business that could make a real difference to the environment today and for years to come. Amelia is an Aussie expat who's lived in the U.S. for 16 years and currently resides in Los Angeles with her daughter, Alta, who is five. And also a frequent fixture on Retold's social media. So enjoy and stay tuned to the end to get a special discount code for your Retold recycling order. Thanks for having me on the pod today, Pam. I'm really happy to be here. My name's Amelia Trumbull, and I'm one of the founders and the CEO of Retold Recycling. And Retold is a really easy and convenient way to declutter your home in a sustainable way. So we have our fabulous yellow bags. I'll hold up the show and tell. I'm not sure if it's going to be visual or not. Yeah, visual. So yeah, we have our yellow bags, which is where we started in 2020. And we wanted to create a method that people could get unwanted clothing and textiles out of their home, but be able to trust that nothing was going to go to landfill. And the way we sort of came to that idea or the concept honestly was that um three of us had been working together for quite a while we were all really good buddies and you know we always talked about possibly starting a company ourselves um but our kind of mandate was that we wanted to do good for the world so it was like it's going to be a non-profit you know does it have a charitable arm like you know what are we going to do yeah and um it just so happened that you know we'd all left that job And a couple of years later, my co-founder Noelle and I, we got together for a dinner and I was complaining to her about how I was renovating my small Brooklyn apartment and I was renovating my closets and I had to declutter a whole lot of stuff. And that I'd been Ubering like big Ikea bags of stuff to Goodwill to try and get it out of my apartment. But like I'm Ubering like I'm adding carbon footprint and then I'll get to the Goodwill and it'll be closed and there's like stuff all over the ground outside and I'm like I don't feel good about this right right I could be walking schlepping things because of course in Brooklyn I didn't have a car you know to a farmer's market but that wasn't super easy and you know in my mind I was like can't I just do this from home you know right yeah and So we started bouncing the idea around and basically I left the dinner and in the Uber on the way home, I wrote Noelle an email saying, why don't we do something like this? Wow. And actually that is the retail business plan that we still execute on today. We've obviously added to it and it's expanded and, you know, we're five years in now at this point. But that was the nucleus of the idea is that it's an easy and convenient way to declutter. Right. And, you know, to be honest, like the thing that really opened it up for us once we started investigating the problem effectively was one that the size of the problem was so acute in terms of landfills and the general behaviour of the population. Right. And not knowing that, you know, when you throw your undies in the trash, you're actually adding to landfill.

Speaker 01: 3:46

Right.

Unknown: 3:48

Yes.

Speaker 00: 3:48

So that was sort of number one. And then two, we felt that the industry was ripe for disruption because there are a lot of very established recycling companies out there who were doing great work, but they weren't customer facing. They weren't, you know, educating on any front and it wasn't the convenience factor. It wasn't really like a consumer to business opportunity. So that's why we decided to pursue it and unlock the opportunity. And yeah, we're super thrilled that we did because you know every day we're a mission-driven business and we get to be you know making the earth a little bit better than it was yesterday i know what right like and to be able to like make a business out of it right like not just yeah you know which is amazing so yeah i don't think um people i mean certainly in most of the u.s anyway i'm sure it's different in other parts of the world but don't put the Like, don't connect the dots between this goes in the trash and then it just disappears. Like, it just, you know, it doesn't, people aren't connecting the dots. But certainly people are and, like, are looking for an easy way that you can just sort of, especially if, you know, people are busy and if you have kids and, you know, just to swap that in, like, is so easy than, like, Ubering your stuff to Goodwill. Exactly. you know putting it in your trunk and then it's in your trunk for yeah that too yeah yeah I mean when we started like extrapolating the idea you know I had that one need because I had a small footprint I had no car I needed ultimate convenience but like you just said my co-founder Noelle she had two kids at that point she's like oh my god the kids clothes like you know things are stained I can't give them as hand-me-downs or donate them like what do I do right and then Alan our third partner had actually just moved at the time and he was like I just literally moved like all my old towels and old sheets and I'm probably going to buy new stuff for my new place like but what do I do with all of that old stuff like I would have rather just you know get rid of all of it before the move and like no easy way of doing that you know he's like I'm calling like animal shelters to see if they'll take stuff and it's like again to your point around the convenience like you know we all love to have the best intentions but quite frankly, something that I fail on all the time because I just don't have the bandwidth to do it. So, yeah. Sorry to interrupt. A lot of the things that you want to do that are better for the planet, they do take a little more effort, unfortunately, you know. So, yeah. So having the bag come to you and it's really, really convenient and there's no reason not to do it. I mean, yeah. Yes, the bag does cost, but I think it's so reasonable and so worth it to be able to have it be convenient and take care of a really big problem, textile waste. I don't know the stats offhand about landfills and textile waste and all that, but it's big. Millions and millions and millions of tons every year, unfortunately. That's even too big to imagine, but the point is it's an enormous problem. I think it might have been some of your social media posts where they're showing some of these it's where a lot of the donated clothes goes around the world. And it's just this huge kind of like ever, you know, never ending sort of problem. So yeah. So gosh. But so I know you have a couple of, so maybe you can tell us a little bit sort of like I sort of alluded to it, but sort of how the, how it works if a consumer wants to do it and that in general, the types of things, I know you have a couple of different types of, Yeah, exactly. I love that. Thank you. So well versed. Need to give you a job. So yeah, exactly. When we did all of that work behind the scenes to set up our recycling infrastructure, basically we work with a whole lot of different partners behind the scenes. So retold itself is not actually recycling. Great news about that is that we are able to tap into all of these Yeah. Yeah. Very domestic. So I love the idea at that any point in time, if there's a problem, I can semi easily get on a plane and go and work out what's happening. And that feels very important to us. Yeah. Our partners are very communicative and transparent. So, you know, there's not really a need to do that. But should there be, we want to make sure that we can get our arms around anything. So we feel very strongly about that as a kind of benchmark for the business when we're choosing partners to work with. And then also really understanding where does everything go. So to your question around like what actually happens with the bags. So, yeah. Basically, the workflow is that you order the bags to your house, you fill them up with any washed textiles. So we'll take clothing, we'll take sheets, bedding, you know, the outside of your dog bed, kids stuffies, like anything that's a textile and just please wash it, put it in your bag. and then seal it up. And the bags that come individually on our site have a mailing label attached. And basically you can leave that out for your postal person. You can drop it at your mailroom, take it to USPS. So it's very easy and turnkey. And then basically the bag comes to us through the post and we do use USPS. So we're not adding incremental postage routes. Like all of those routes are already running all over the U.S., So we're pretty covered there. So you don't have extra transportation like costs and energy and all that stuff. Okay. I didn't realize that. That's great. Yeah. That's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we try, we try. We didn't think of everything as happens with most small business. But basically once the bags arrive at our recycling partner, we have things set up on the backend so that your bag will go to the closest hub that we have. So we also try and limit the footprint that it's traveling. And so it goes to our recycling partner and they open the bags, sort everything And basically anything that can be resold will go to a thrift store network. And then anything else that is left over will basically be downcycled. And that can go to rag companies. So that's all. what happens with like sheets and towels and things like that. And then more one-off like ad hoc items of clothing, your one sock, your old undies, you know, smelly gym t-shirt, whatever the case may be. That all gets broken down into a pulp. And that pulp is used for things like moving blankets, insulation. You know, it can be woven into the squishy floor in playgrounds. My favorite is that it's the inside of punching bags and padding with boxing gloves so the exciting thing is more and more um as companies are becoming aware of um you know this output what what the industry calls shoddy um the great news is that more and more companies are trying to use that instead of virgin materials for the inside padding of things right um so that's great because that means there's a demand there for the output Right, yeah. Yeah, so that's our classic yellow bag. Then we also have our scraps bag. So our scraps bag is really for people who are super crafty, sew, quilt, do at-home projects, you know, like my mum's, you know, taking up my jeans or whatever the case may be, dropping them for me, like a strip of denim, the offcuts of everything, basically things that couldn't be saleable or, you know, have been chopped up. Yeah. Could really go into a scraps bag. Okay. And scraps bag goes directly to a different partner of ours and they just literally open the bag and dump it in their machine and it gets shredded and downcycled. Oh, okay, great. Yeah, it goes to a different partner because there isn't that sort of like resale process in the mix and it couldn't go for rags because they're also... Yeah, sorry, pieces, yeah. Yeah, exactly. So we have our scraps bag. So, you know, some people who are super quilty and cruddy But very eco minded. They go with the two different bag solutions. You know, they have their classic bag that sits in their laundry room or in their wardrobe for any clothes they want to declutter. And then their scraps bag will often sit like next to their knitting or their sewing table or in their craft room, that kind of thing. I mean, that's awesome. Yeah.

Unknown: 13:19

Right.

Speaker 00: 13:19

Go ahead. Sorry. Yeah. And honestly, like when we launched in 2020, we started having, because during COVID, so many people were crafting at home and we had this community coming to us saying, can we put our scraps in your bag? And we always said yes, but our recycling partner on the back end didn't love that because imagine like clothes that could be resold, but they've got fuzzy wuzzies all over them. Right. Like pieces of yarn and like, yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, so that's why we created the scraps bag and it took us a while to find the right partner to send all of that to, but we've nailed it now and it's a great process. So everyone's happy. And then most recently we've launched our three bags in a box. Oh, right. This is the product that is slowly rolling out to be available at different retail locations. Oh, wow, awesome. So we're selling it on our website too. Awesome. the three bags in the box is that it doesn't have the mailing label attached. So for the price point, you get the three bags and then you scan the QR code and we have a label generator and you jump on and buy your labels to print and stick on later. So basically that gives, you know, one, a super like gifty little box that for any of your eco-minded friends, you could give them. And then when you're using the bags, you can just go on and pay for the label whenever you're ready to send it off. So it's kind of more on your terms, you know, paying for everything up front. Wow, that's really cool. Yeah, so that's our latest innovation and we launched it sort of in a low-key way just before Christmas and it's gone absolutely crazy, to be honest. Awesome. We're in the process of making more because, yeah, everyone loved it. That's amazing. So you said it'll be in stores, like in retail locations? Yeah, so we're in the process of trying to finalise some eco-grocery i know you're on the east coast but more on the west coast where we are and then we'll expand across the country but also gift stores you know um hotel gift shops yeah um anywhere that sort of makes sense like also within fashion retailers like honestly wherever it makes sense for us to sell a box we're happy to because it's adding sort of that sustainable option to all of these businesses that's very cool that's amazing it's hard to get into retail right yeah i mean yes we're chipping away we've been at it for a bit yeah coming together yeah so so right now the bags are available for sale like on your website correct exactly yeah retortrecycling.com okay so that's where people can go um and i have to ask i like i'm dying to hear a little bit more about the shark tank just because about yes i mean i watched it and then you know you never know really what happens after the fact on the show for sure we were the same before we went on to be honest so yes our and my co-founder and I were on an episode of Shark Tank which aired um god it feels like it was just yesterday but it was back in 2023 and um honestly we you know I really had very low expectations going into it um their casting team had found us so we were looking to go on and we were just like um okay let's explore the process and we kept going and kept going and kept going and then they were like yeah so you're gonna tape in like two weeks and we were like oh my god okay and then like you know the blood just drains from your face and you're like what am I gonna do um but honestly it was very intense in the tank um you know they told us to leave you know nothing you know is unsaid negotiate your hardest you know do Walk out of there knowing that you did what was right for your business. So I took that to heart and did try and negotiate with Mark Cuban, which didn't go well. I saw that. And we very quickly backtracked and we're like, okay, no problem. Yeah, it's good. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But, you know, it is intense. Like they walk in, the sharks walk into the tank. They don't know anything about your business other than the name and your names. Oh, wow. So you've really got to, yeah, fill them in. Exactly. And that's why the pitch, the pitch is rehearsed. So you work on that a lot with your producing team. Okay. And you go in with that. But then after the pitch, it's a free-for-all. Okay. You don't know where the first question is going to come from. You don't know if you need like a launch pad to start the dialogue. Yeah, yeah. You know, usually the sharks want the airtime, so they'll just start talking and getting into it. But, yeah, it was very intense. So we were in the tank for probably sort of like 25, 30 minutes.

Speaker 01: 18:05

Okay. And

Speaker 00: 18:06

I think the clip is like maybe seven minutes or something along those lines.

Speaker 01: 18:10

Yeah.

Speaker 00: 18:11

And the chronology is different from what you see in the episode. That's not exactly how things played out. However, you know, it's pretty close. There were a few things that were left out. Like we had a big dialogue because Alan, my co-founder, and I, we're both Australian, as you can probably tell from the accent. So Robert's wife is Australian, so we had like an Aussie love fest for a while. You know, so there were some like fun parts of it that were know that didn't go to air yeah but yeah we were honestly you know thrilled we going into it we didn't think that mark would be the shark for us like i thought maybe laurie because of her connections or emma greed who's the ceo of skims and good american on our episode so we thought maybe she'd jump in having the fashion background Yeah, yeah. But, yeah, Mark asked us questions up front and then he went very quiet while all of the rest of them grilled us.

Speaker 01: 19:13

Yeah,

Speaker 00: 19:14

yeah. And then, you know, passed. And then it kind of came back to Mark and we'd assumed because he wasn't talking more that he wasn't interested anymore. Right, yeah. And, you know, it very much felt like like very scary, to be honest with you, where one shark after another passes. And I'm just like, this is our brand being obliterated before our eyes. Like how can these people not believe in us and our mission? And they did, but they didn't see a viable business in it. And then we swung back around to Mark again and he was like, I totally get where you need to go. This needs to be in every 7-Eleven in America. It needs to be every dry cleaner store. It just needs to be en masse. And that's when the adoption will come because, you know, to your point earlier, it's about education. Like how do we just get the problem in front of people and for them to be aware that, you know, they're doing the wrong thing. Right. Exactly.

Unknown: 20:12

Exactly.

Speaker 00: 20:12

And he's like, I'm going to make you a deal. And so we ended up taking it. And honestly, it's been fabulous. That's so cool. That's great. Yeah, Mark is on email with us as much as we need to. You know, he will respond to emails personally. He's been absolutely lovely and so encouraging. I had no idea. I was just curious. Yeah. Yeah. And we work very closely with his team. Like we're kind of assigned a couple of people to work with us and they're great. And we meet with them, you know, once a month. And honestly, like the money itself has been a cherry on top. Like really, you know, their connections, Mark's endorsement of us. Yeah. That has just gone so far. So for us, Shark Tank was amazing. That's awesome. So did that have anything to do with sort of the development of the three bags in a box or not? Okay, got it. Exactly. Yeah. I mean, that's all of Mark's, you know, one part of his investment went into the development of that.

Speaker 01: 21:15

Okay, okay.

Speaker 00: 21:16

Yeah, we sort of like earmarked like different sort of growth strategies and sort of put some of the funds against that and obviously invested our own money as well. But, yeah, that's exactly what we're trying to do with Three Bags in the Box. And recently we just announced there's a dry cleaners association called America's Best Cleaners. And we just announced a strategic partnership where all of the America's Best Cleaners affiliates are able to stock the three bags in the box in their dry cleaner stores so if anyone's interested go on the America's Best Cleaners site and check out where your local affiliate is and then you'll be able to buy bags or the boxes through those locations so that's a way of sort of like widespread getting it out there and then the great news is because we've you know, had that partnership set up. Now other dry cleaners are coming to us and say, hey, how do I get involved? Oh, right. Yeah. So that sort of helps like expand that footprint. Yeah. Snowballs or ripple effect or whatever. Yeah. I think that's what it takes. Like you just, you know, people start to realize and learn and then they sort of tell friends or whatever they see. Yeah. So that's, oh, that's amazing. That's so great. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. We're working hard on, you know, the retail expansion side of things.

Speaker 01: 22:37

But

Speaker 00: 22:37

also, you know, another area that has really emerged for us over the last couple of years and really accelerated with Shark Tank is kind of the work we do with brands and corporates, whether it's like white labeling our bags, setting up, you know, Earth Week events for them, doing collections in their retail stores, educate, there's a lot of educational programs we do for corporate, like webinars and things like that. So, yeah, we We just kind of, we had opportunity come to us and, you know, I like to say we just sort of yesed everything and then worked out how to do it behind the scenes. So a lot of that work is very, very rewarding because it means that we can sort of create one program and reach a lot of people. Yeah, I mean, great mission.

Unknown: 23:24

Yeah.

Speaker 00: 23:24

Because it's not just a product. It's bigger than that. You know what I mean? So, wow. I'm so excited for you guys. That's so great. Thank you. It's really cool. I'm trying to think if I had other questions. I was kind of curious about do people put a lot of wrong stuff in the bags? Is there a lot of sorting of like... Yeah, I mean, the sorting definitely goes into it. The wrong stuff, like, to be honest, if it's a textile, we just kind of take it anyway. Yeah, yeah. we say that we don't take shoes mainly because it's like we can't really recycle them but there is a large resale market for shoes so they'll quite often end up at a thrift store so we try and do absolutely everything we can with what comes in um and you know generally we're finding a home like even if we do have to down cycle things you know like a handbag or whatever that's we try and do that like a waste to energy. So at least if it's, if it's being broken down, it's not truly recycled. We're outputting something positive on the backend, but that's more of a rare case. I will say like our customers love to ask very detailed questions about what can go in their bag and, So we're often, you know, they're sort of one step ahead of us and doing their due diligence before they fill their bags. Right. Like, what about this? So what about that? I know I've asked. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So like creative ones like, oh, you know, what about, you know, the bag that my tent came in or like that kind of thing. It's sort of like, oh, do you know what? Like, what's the fabrication? Yeah.

Unknown: 25:07

Yeah.

Speaker 00: 25:07

But, yeah, we love the effort because that means that they, you know, those customers have the groundswell of like wanting to do the right thing. And they're most likely to tell their friends. They're most likely to write us a review. So it's like whatever we can do to help. Yeah, they're thinking about it. So they're trying to figure out something different to do than just. put it in the link. So yeah, exactly. Awesome. Okay. So I already asked, so people can get the products currently on your website. So that's, um, so we'll definitely put a link for them right to your website to get, uh, to place orders and stuff and then, um, For the dry cleaning. Yeah, jump on, look at America's Best Cleaners. America's Best Cleaners. For those locations. And then, yeah, once we have like actual boxes in stores, we'll add a store locator to our site so you can find locally where you could go to a grocery store or gift shop or whatever the case may be and pick up. pick up those boxes so yeah getting it out there yeah that's amazing I like I said I love the product it's such a it's so easy which is you know one of the you know unfortunately one of the things that it has to be for people to sort of start doing it in part but but it is really really super easy and it's it's it's great I love love the company love you guys and yeah I mean if there's anything else you want to share I mean I think you've told us oh I just I mean thank you so much for your energy around a Pam I think you know the other thing that we've really found as we've launched this business is sort of almost like a the spiritual feel good of like actually you know you might be doing something practical in your home like making more space or you know making an area look nicer or whatever but you can really feel good about what you're doing by using the retail bags and making sure that things aren't going to landfills and you know I like to say like as you're decluttering your home you're opening it up for like good things to come in so it's sort of like a nice like you know it's a bit woo Woo, but like, you know, some people energy. So I can feel that from you. So I love that we're having this exchange. Yeah. Well, yeah. Thank you again. I really appreciate it. And I'll definitely put links to everything so people can, you know, find you guys, buy your bags, keep their stuff out of the landfill and send you lots of weird questions about what they can and can't put in the bag. We love it. Thanks so much for your time, Pam. Thank you so much. Yeah. Alrighty. I'll see you soon. Take care. Okay. Bye-bye. Check the show notes below for links to Retold Recycling and be sure to use the discount code GreenWife10 on your order. Okay. See you next time.