Innovation

Lani Cahyaningsari is a Mompreneur, the founder of Kaleng Lani who started her business back in 2000. With an architect background, she was working in a construction company in Indonesia for a couple years before the Indonesian crisis in 1998 and the company went bankrupt. Blessing talent in painting, together with her sisters- in-law, she started the business based on her passion in painting, and doing experiments with some media painting.

She got an idea painting in cans media from her mother-in-law who collected milk cans waste. With a touch of her painting pop-art and childish style, transform cans waste appearance become cute and unique, thus providing added value and loved by children and young mothers in general.

She named her brand 'Kaleng Lani' and the brand is now popular among online-moms around netizens especially in Jakarta, and sold around Indonesia and some overseas.

Kaleng Lani is a product innovation, transforming from cans waste into beautiful pop-art and childish painted functional crafts/tools, such as piggy banks, pencils/pens case, trash bins and clocks.

The vision are:

- to elevate of waste cans, which always increasing in number and difficult to be rotten into beautiful functional craft/tools and have economic value.

- have a decent place for students to come and see the creative recycled cans works process, can try to make as well, and can buy cans that have been painted.

-Develop a creative process.

The business vision is in line with the Triple Bottom Line (3 P’s):

- Planet: ensuring conducive environment through continuously caring for the community and environmental safety

- People: workers’ health and safety and employee morale, engagement, and development to corporate culture and good corporate governance.

- Profit: the basis for the continuation of a company, and is a precondition to achieve the other two social dimensions.

The activities include:

- Recycled handicraft & Souvenir

- Workshop, to education and train students and young mothers

- Eco-friendly product, use paint antitoxin which is safe for children

- Creative Green Campaign, through workshop and eye catching painting products

- Community Empowerment, create jobs and awareness to use cans wisely

Inspiration

• As a start-up, Lani Cahyaningsari, The Founder of Kaleng Lani, received an award as Female Inspirational from Nova Magazine in 2011. Lani is also often invited in schools and mothers association to share the painting class on cans media to the students. Interviewed by several TV stations, online and offline media, sharing about modifying of cans waste into beautiful painted functional goods.
• As her purpose in elevating cans waste, Kaleng Lani wants to be an inspiration for children to be creative or to housewives who want to have extra income.
• Transforming cans waste into beautiful and useful goods that have high sales value, much better than let them become breeding grounds for mosquitoes causing dengue fever.
• Participate in preserving the earth, with the reuse of goods that are not used, especially coming from cans.

Overall impact

Recycling cans reduces the risk of flooding and climate change. In addition, providing income and jobs for local residents too. The business has several impacts:

· Reduce waste

· Contribute in preserving the environment by reducing pollution of cans waste and make value added of it

· Increase environmental awareness of the society through education and workshops

· Increase the soft skill of the society, especially in recycling cans waste into functional tools and making profit from them.

· Promote the transforming cans waste functional tools into the world

Business benefit

Creative recycling is promising business. Kaleng Lani grasped this opportunity, equipped with talent in painting and creativity, she formulated them to be an innovation. Waste cans were able to be transformed into a unique and funny products with high value.

Lani usually collected cans from the surrounding environment, there is a form of milk cans or biscuit tins that she bought for IDR1,000 to IDR2,000 per unit. What makes Kaleng Lani so attractive are the themes and images created by Lani are very "eyes catching" and the colors used are also very diverse and make the little ones interested in seeing it.

Lani has no issues in collecting the raw materials. She build a good relationship with various parties to supply used milk cans as required. For example, from artisan ice fruit supply canned sweetened condensed milk or empty cans of baby milk.

She also relied on friends and relatives to donate used cans, mainly from her mother in law who regularly makes cakes for sale. The tin cans Lani bought with a price range of IDR1,000 to IDR2,000 per tin.

She express her talent in painting on cans waste with paint colors and cute patterns. This keeps people interested by creative products from Lani. In fact, the product has already penetrated markets of Australia, Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei Darussalam.

She sells her product at a very affordable price of about IDR15,000 to IDR900,000 depend on product's size and complexity in process. Approximately 40 types of product theme and variants, for 150-200 unit products sold per month, or from 200-250 unit produced per month, Lani able to achieve revenue IDR10 millions to IDR15 millions per month, with profit around IDR5 millions to IDR8 millions.

Social and environmental benefit

Kaleng Lani’s social and environmental benefits:

• Elevating cans waste become something with added value

• Inspiring people recycle the cans waste into functional goods

• Inspiring students and mothers to explore their creativity

• Creating sustainable products

• Extending the life cycle of cans waste

• Minimizing and reducing the amount of cans wastes

• Social Campaign about awareness in using cans wisely to preserving the environment

Interview

Lani Cahyaningsari, Founder