The idea was born over trays of sushi.
Felix Bock, then studying for a doctorate at the University of British Columbia in Canada, was venting his frustration over the scant interest in his proposal to use waste wood from demolition and construction sites.
How, he wondered, could he convince people that there is no such thing as waste, but rather just wasted resources?
Chopsticks in hand, Thalia Otamendi, the woman who is now his fiancee, looked at him.
“She said: ‘Felix, maybe you just have to start with something small, and maybe it’s the chopstick,’” Bock said.
Bock started working on the idea the next day, sketching out plans for ChopValue, a start-up aimed at creating a second life for used chopsticks.
The plans soon coalesced into actions; recycling bins were dropped off at restaurants across Vancouver, methods were perfected to clean the utensils and a process was developed to transform the chopsticks — most of which are made from bamboo — into sleek household items that range from tablet stands to tabletops.
Four years on, ChopValue has recycled more than 32 million chopsticks — diverting them from landfills and creating employment for 40 people.
“These chopsticks travel 6,000 miles [9,656km] to arrive on your dining table for 20 to 30 minutes,” said Bock, 31. “You can’t possibly feel good about throwing them out afterwards.”
The start-up has expanded its footprint across North America, with its process — which uses heat, steam and pressure to transform the chopsticks into wooden tiles — now also being used in Los Angeles, Montreal and Calgary, Alberta.
Chopsticks are sourced from hundreds of restaurants, as well as shopping centers, airports and universities; in Vancouver alone, ChopValue said that it collects about 350,000 used chopsticks a week.
“When you walk into a restaurant and you ask them to place a recycling bin for chopsticks, they still give you the exact same look as they gave me on day one,” Bock said. “I think it’s because it’s one of these little things that we neglect, but the moment someone reminds us of that problem that’s right in front of us, it creates that immediate ‘Aha’ moment.”
Among the first companies to collaborate with ChopValue was Pacific Poke, a chain of restaurants based in western Canada.
“We thought it was a great idea. We were like: ‘Why didn’t anyone else think of this?’” Pacific Poke cofounder Dong Lam said. “We’re selling a couple of hundred bowls a day, so you can imagine how many chopsticks that adds up to over time.”
The restaurant chain has become a fine example of the circular economy that ChopValue is seeking to foster, with most of its outlets featuring artwork and tabletops made from chopsticks once used at the restaurant.
At ChopValue, the focus is now on exporting the model.
“We do want to mass produce, just on a local scale,” Bock said.
Bock’s aim is a network of franchises where chopsticks could be sourced from local restaurants and transformed in nearby microfactories, with the products being sold locally.
The company’s products are currently sold on its Web site and through partnerships with retailers such as Nordstrom in the US.
With each item comes a hint of its previous life, detailing the 886 chopsticks that go into making a butcher’s block or the 9,600 chopsticks used for a work-from-home desk.
“We’ve made money since day one,” Bock said. “We obviously reinvested every dollar we made into growth because we feel that the responsibility right now is to expand the concept globally.”
His hope is that ChopValue — and the “crazy idea” behind it — would prompt people to reconsider what they see as waste.
“There’s this cheesy saying that every small action matters, but I think we’re proving that in a fairly practical and exciting way,” he said.
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