by Eileen Weber
Heading out to Seattle any time soon? If you are, you may want to check out the Green Festival, arguably the largest sustainability event promoting green living. The Green Festival is a joint project between Global Exchange and Green America, two non-profit organizations committed to environmental change. So far, they expect 35,000 attendees to converge on the Seattle area the weekend of March 28th and 29th.
But here’s a little tidbit of information that might be interesting to native Nutmeggers: The Naked Binder, a sister company of Library Binding Service (LBS) based in Iowa, will be attending the festival. They will be showcasing a few of their eco-binders made from 97% post-consumer recycled materials from Connecticut.
“Our board supplier has a recycling plant that collects recycling in Connecticut,” said Ken James, Division Manager of The Naked Binder. “The paper is the recycling that you leave out by the street—all post-consumer waste.”
Considering the waste involved with vinyl binders, The Naked Binder, a company that also supports 1% For The Planet, sought a better alternative. Their product is based on a “cradle-to-cradle” concept. It takes into consideration the “lifecycle” of every component in their products and not just the finished version.
The binders are made from pressed board, metallic clips and, in some cases, organic cotton wrapping. “The rings are our sticking point,” said James of their popular binders. “There are no U.S. manufacturers of ring systems so we import these. The book cloth, packaging materials and boxes we get locally.” James also said they get their materials locally. The cloth and packaging materials come from LBS and the boxes come from just down the street.
While the post-consumer waste comes from this neck of the woods, the binder boards are made in Chicago and the products are manufactured in Des Moines, according to their web site. No toxins are used in manufacturing, shipping, or packaging. And, their binder has been tested 50,000 times for durability by an independent lab.
Ken James elaborated the point about the lab testing by saying that the binder board is the same board as those used in books. He said, “They need to withstand the forces of the spine being pressed into the board.” As CEO Fritz James claims on the site, “They will last. I've used mine for 11 years for all my bills and tax info. I still use it.”
Naked Binder plans on implementing a new two-inch D-ring binder and possibly a two- and-a-half inch D-ring. One binder they are still working on is one sized at 17” X 11”. These products are meant to store huge amounts of paper like musical scores.
“One of the prototypes is being tested by Composer Matan Rubinstein who was the instigator of that binder,” said Ken James of the 17” X 11” binder. “Composers of large scores are having trouble finding binders that can hold their materials. They are great, but unless we can generate some interest, we will wait a bit.”
Naked Binder is partnering with Ecoscene, a web site and eco-magazine that provides information on eco-friendly products and services, at the Seattle event. “Ecoscene is an online company that reviews green products,” said James. “They spend time with their products and do their research, so we decided to pair up with them.”
“This is the first time Naked Binder has been to the Festival,” he said. James indicated that the company will be displaying their bare board binder, among other products, as well as giving them out as samples.
After Seattle, the Green Festival will move on to Denver and Chicago in May, Washington, D.C. in October, and San Francisco in November.
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