Rip Curl expands its wetsuit recycling program globally

Karen Pham

Karen Pham

Ripcurl

Rip Curl, the Australian-founded international surfwear brand, is expanding its “Recycle Your Wetsuit” beyond Australia into the US and Europe to offer surfers a way to reduce their footprint on the environment.

The brand partnered with TerraCycle – the global recycling leader – to launch the wetsuit recycling program last year and chose to go worldwide last month.

Customers can send their surfing wetsuits via post or drop them off at stores. To reduce the amount of wetsuit rubber going into landfill each year, the program will repurpose the recycled rubber for use in things like the safety layer of soft fall matting used at playgrounds and outdoor gyms.

“Since the program launched, we are pleased to have seen more than 1600 Australian customers dedicating time and effort to return their surfing wetsuits for recycling,” said Shasta O’Loughlin, Rip Curl’s environmental, social and governance manager.

“We’re proud to be able to extend this program to our US, France, Spain and Portugal customers, helping to provide them with an avenue to do their bit for the environment.”

O’Loughlin also hopes to create a wider impact by educating global customers to consider the end-of-life impact of their purchase.

Jean Bailliard, GM at TerraCycle ANZ, said Australians have saved more than 2.5 tonnes of old wetsuits from landfills in a little over a year thanks to the Rip Curl ‘Recycle Your Wetsuit’ program. 

Karen Pham

Karen Pham

Karen Pham is a marketing and branding enthusiast with a major in legal English. Based in Ho Chi Minh City, she is a contributor to Viable.Earth.

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