EcoSneakers looks to boost the upcycling game

The following is a transcript of the Weather Channel video down below.

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Paul Goodloe [00:00:00] And one nonprofit is making the necessary strides towards a greener future. One shoe at a time.

Lynette Charles [00:00:07] It’s called EcoSneakers, and its mission is to help give shoes to those who are less fortunate or recycle those materials, all while keeping sneakers out of the landfills. EcoSneakers founder Bobby Johnson joins us in the studio this morning. Bobby, thank you so much for being here, we appreciate that. So first things first. What basically motivated you to start up the start up this nonprofit?

Bobby Johnson [00:00:30] It’s a couple of things. It’s kind of like a full circle. As a kid growing up, there was a landfill. And I used to go to the landfill and just play around and that created creativity like refrigerator tops…I used to get home and make little boats. But when I came to Atlanta, I gave one pair of shoes away to someone in need, and it just snowball effect.

Paul Goodloe [00:00:53] Let’s talk about the shoes, because I grabbed a pair of my son’s yard working shoes. So when people donate shoes, will they definitely find their way onto someone else’s feet or are there other purposes for them?

Bobby Johnson [00:01:04] There’s different purposes for on some are wearable, you know, to just about people everywhere. And then and once it’s not wearable, we grind up and make filler for like stuffed animals.

Paul Goodloe [00:01:18] Oh, so like this guy here. This is all former shoe products.

Bobby Johnson [00:01:21] That’s right! Like this one, that one. What we do is we fill these with recycled cotton and polyester and then also a sneaker grind.

Lynette Charles [00:01:33] Oh, that’s cool. Okay, so what other milestones has your nonprofit started or reached since you’ve started?

Bobby Johnson [00:01:39] Oh, since we started, we’ve we’ve repurposed more than 457 shoes all over the United States. Wow.

Paul Goodloe [00:01:48] So how do people donate this to your kind of cause?

Bobby Johnson [00:01:53] Well, just go to “www.ecosneakers.org”, and hit on the location button and I’ll give you directions on how to donate.

Lynette Charles [00:02:00] So you started this and, you know, there’s a lot of people that they want to do something for the environment. They want to do good. But sometimes people think like, “Oh, that’s just so difficult. I could never have a sneaker start up that whole thing. Like, what’s a piece of advice that you could give somebody to push them along their way to do something that’s for the environment and help it?

Bobby Johnson [00:02:19] Well, just donate to us.

Lynette Charles [00:02:21] There you go! That’s a good one. Anything other than that? Like just, you know, someone that’s like looking at you, you’re kind of they’re admiring you right now and they want to be you. And they you know, they want to do something like what would you what advice would you give them?

Bobby Johnson [00:02:33] We would love to help people volunteer. We love for them to do a sneaker drives all over. Just go to “ecosneakers.org” and look at that.

Paul Goodloe [00:02:41] Nice. So in terms of… Your purpose is some shoes are good enough to be given to other people to wear. Others like my son to shoes here are really not that worthwhile. So I mean, in terms of an impact on landfills, what is your company kind of doing in terms of perhaps delaying the kind of destruction or kind of throwing away of some of these products?

Bobby Johnson [00:03:04] Well, what we’re doing is we’re trying to find as many products as possible that we can turn these shoes into, like we can even take these this grind and make seat cushions.

Lynette Charles [00:03:18] Oh, neat. Oh, Seat cushions. Oh, okay. Okay. And so at this point, is it just sneakers that you guys are working on or do you have anything in the future that it might be more?

Bobby Johnson [00:03:26] No. Right now, the only thing we accept are sneakers.

Lynette Charles [00:03:30] Okay.

Paul Goodloe [00:03:31] So what about the business model? I mean, is this is this going to save other companies money or is it more along the lines of it saves their carbon footprint in terms of not taking unused or brand new material and putting it in things like kid’s toys or even seat cushion filler?

Bobby Johnson [00:03:45] Well, for instance, the sneakers, right? It takes 2257 gallons to make one pair of shoes. So when we save a sneaker from landfill, we’re also conserving water.

Lynette Charles [00:03:56] Oh, that’s awesome. So how long have you been doing this for?

Bobby Johnson [00:03:59] Ten years now. A decade.

Paul Goodloe [00:04:02] Is it just sneakers, athletic shoes, or can it be, you know, loafers or dress shoes or women’s shoes? Is there a cutoff of what you kind of can repurpose?

Bobby Johnson [00:04:11] No. The only thing that we can work with is sneakers only. We don’t do boots, loafers or dress shoes.

Paul Goodloe [00:04:19] How do you do it? How do you cut it into as little particles?

Bobby Johnson [00:04:21] We have a grinder and we find a way to take the shoes apart and then feed into the grinder. And magic happens.

Lynette Charles [00:04:29] Nice. All right, so we have eco sneakers Founder Bobby Johnson. Thank you so much for being here today. We truly appreciate it.

Bobby Johnson [00:04:35] Thank you so much.

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