Two companies in southwest Japan's Fukuoka Prefecture have developed all-cardboard clothes hangers that can be used in dress shirt bagging machines as they aim to reduce plastic waste.
The hangers were developed by Daikoku Cardboard Co., a laundry services company in Fukuoka, after they were matched by the prefectural government's Fukuoka Research Commercialization Center for Recycling Systems FRC The FRC, a policy-promoting research organization that works on the 3 Rs reducing, reuse, and recycling waste, in order to create new businesses and switch to renewable resources. The development is a first in the dry-cleaning industry, according to the companies.
The hangers are assembled with two parts: the body, and a hook made of two layers of cardboard to increase their load-bearing strength. The body is produced in a way that reduces scrap material, saving on costs in an advancement that is hoped to spread across the industry.
The hangers will be installed at Ursa's four Solairo Cleaning Factory locations in Fukuoka's Hakata Ward. They will replace the roughly 20,000 half-width plastic hangers the company uses for dress shirts every year. The company said that over half of the plastic hangers are discarded by customers. Because they're cardboard, the parts in the new hangers can be replaced if either becomes damaged, and can be recycled into new cardboard when they're no longer reusable.
The Ursa GroupUrsa Group said they would like to develop full-size hangers next.