Ngoc Vu
Victoria Wass
Ina Seppänen
Wallayaniti Polem
Hanken School of Economics
Martin Fougere
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With the objective of enabling businesses to responsibly manage their end-of-life textiles, Rester has built a circular economy facility in Paimio. The facility plays an important role in addressing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly responsible consumption and production (goal 12). By transforming businesses end-of-life textiles into fresh raw materials and focusing on industrial waste streams, Rester contributes to the United Nations 2030 goal of reducing waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling, and reuse. Rester’s innovation not only supports environmental sustainability, but also promotes economic growth and productive employment while reducing the amount of natural resources, which helps to achieve the climate change goals.
The textile industry is responsible for a considerable amount of waste and CO2 emissions. Rester’s business innovation is to extend the life cycle of used textiles. Rester collects and processes all kinds of textiles e.g., mixed materials, wool, cotton, polyester etc. The process begins with collecting and sorting the material by colors and by composition, and then they open the textiles back into fibers. The collected textile materials are used to produce fibers, which can be used to manufacture fabric, yarn, and different non-woven materials (insulations, car interior etc. The production technology is based on a mechanical process of cleaning and sorting that does not use any water or chemicals and is thus sustainable and environmentally friendly. Rester processes companies' discarded textiles into recycled fiber, which reduces the amount of natural resources, and this in turn helps to achieve the climate change goals. In addition, Rester promotes sustained economic growth and productive employment.
Rester's initial innovation idea arose from the aspiration to enhance sustainability within the textile industry, given the substantial waste produced by the sector. The disposal of this waste often involves incineration, contributing to CO2 emissions.
The goal is to promote responsible consumption by encouraging more recyclable fibers in textile production. By doing so, there is reduced demand for new materials.
Rester's innovation emerged by bringing together individuals from diverse fields, including logistics and recycling, to delve into sustainability research in Finland. This initiative coincided with the commencement of the European Union's legislation prohibiting the incineration of textile waste. The convergence of these factors inspired Rester to pioneer a new sustainable approach. The company collected data, explored processes, and examined related machines, marking the starting point of Rester's sustainable story.
Furthermore, beyond the information and legislation changes, Rester is motivated and inspired by the passion to create a better world. Because of that, the company came up with a strong perspective of “doable” and did not hesitate to scale up and become the first in the market. Engblom (2023) mentioned that “it is obvious, and we realized that it is better to be the first to do this on a big scale than second or last”.
The company’s strong vision to create a better world as well as the understanding of the business nature maintained their energy to continuously develop a sustainable business.
Rester provides solutions for reducing carbon dioxide emissions and improving production efficiency with minimal resource utilization. By incorporating more recyclable fibers in textile manufacturing, the demand for virgin materials decreases. This not only conserves natural resources such as land and water but also ensures a more sustainable environmental impact for future generations. Rester’s business plays a role in conserving essential resources like land and water, guaranteeing their availability for future generations. This approach results in a diminished environmental footprint, benefiting both people and the planet.
On a long-term basis, the company has also noticed other positive impacts that the innovative recycling concept brought about. Firstly, Rester has formed partnerships with other industry players such as Lindström and Lounais-Suomen Jätehuolto (Rester, 2023). The company especially appreciates the share of common objectives and business conducts with its partners (reflecting SDG 17). Secondly, the company has had the opportunity to internationalize its business. Founded in Finland, Rester is currently expanding its operations and business network across countries (mainly in Europe) such as the Netherlands and Sweden (Engblom, 2023).
Rester has indeed benefited its surrounding community in certain ways. The important thing is that the company offers a potential solution for the contemporary issue in the textile industry, textile waste. The foundation of the business was to minimize and treat industrial waste of the textile sector in a sustainable way. As a result, the economy, specifically that of Finland, has a prospective approach to tackle one of many societal challenges related to industrialization (reflecting SDG 9, 12). Moreover, Rester’s operations apparently contribute to national economic growth and boost employment rate (reflecting SDG 8).
On the other hand, the innovative concept of recycling and reproducing fabrics by Rester has substantial impacts on the environment and on the societal journey to sustainable development. Undoubtedly, by reusing discarded materials and turning them into new forms of functional textile, the company implies its objective to promote circular utilization of textiles. Consequently, the production process is made more efficient and less waste-generating (reflecting SDG 12). In addition, Rester eventually creates outputs of material fully through the mechanical recycling process with its unique technology. Thus, the interviewee (Engblom, 2023) prospects that the use of land and water for the agricultural production of virgin cotton could be immensely reduced (reflecting SDG 12, 13).
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Rester Oy is a Finnish circular textile company founded in 2019. The company recovers end-of-life textiles and uses state of the art technology to recycle them into new high-quality fiber. This sustainably produced raw material can be reused for manufacturing new textiles. (Rester 2023) The goal is to help companies in the textile industry to become more environmentally friendly and to meet the following United Nations sustainable development goals: Decent work and economic growth (goal 8), Industry, innovation and infrastructure (goal 9), Responsible consumption and production (goal 12), Climate action (goal 13), and Partnerships for the goals (goal 17) (United Nations 2023).