In our video above, we reference a TV segment about Funky Junk created by the BBC.
For the short version click here. (about 1 minute)
For the long version click here. (about 10 minutes)
It’s a very well done piece about an incredible story, and we highly encourage you to take the time to check out at least the short version. We can tell you that if you commit to watching the long version, it will be the best 10 minutes of your day. :)
The Project
Funky Junk, an amazing social enterprise based in Cambodia, has partnered with Hipcycle, the web's leading source of upcycled products, to begin distributing their product line in North America. With your help, we can launch this beautiful, durable, and functional eco-product line and also tell the inspiring Fuinky Junk story to a North American audience.
Hipcycle will create a wholesale channel for Funky Junk products, and has partnered with the Center for Vocational Rehabilitation to pack and ship Funky Junk orders. CVR is an organization in Eatontown, NJ that does really great work by providing employment and job readiness training to people with disabilities.
The Funky Junk Story
![rubbish]( "Rubbish")
In developing countries, where garbage collection services are minimal and environmental awareness takes second place to basic survival, plastic bags are everywhere: clogging drains, choking animals, and blighting already difficult lives.
So Funky Junk decided to do something about it.
Funky Junk Recycled is an innovative social enterprise – making beautiful, functional, long-lasting items in Cambodia from used plastic bags reclaimed from streets and fields.
Supporting Funky Junk means contributing to a cleaner environment and providing fair trade income, training and community benefits for its local producers.
Funky Junk Recycled spent a number of years designing and implementing its processes and products with the aim of providing sustainable income for a group of local people without a major investment in technology, equipment or capacity building.
By creating a self-sustaining enterprise, they use business best practices as a means of improving peoples’ living environment, while helping them to gain a source of income and a sense of self-worth.
![workshop]( "workshop")
The community groups Funky Junk works with are carefully selected to ensure that they are capable of self-management after a training and implementation period. A local project manager is backed by the Funky Junk co-operative board, made up of a team of voluntary advisors with business and NGO backgrounds.
Fair trade experts ensure that the business model follows international best practices and creates a harmonious environment where hard work and initiative is rewarded.
All products are made from discarded plastic bags, collected by trash pickers from the towns and countryside, and delivered to the Funky Junk center. Here they are washed, disinfected and dried in the sun before being sorted by color. The bags are cut and made into yarn, which is then crocheted into our fabulous product line.
What We Need & What You Get
We are seeking to raise $20,000 to get this project off the ground:
![Funky Junk Bag]( "Funky Junk Bag")
- $4,000 for a new e-commerce website which will be located at funkyjunkrecycled.us. This will become the portal for wholesale distribution of Funky Junk in North America.
- $3,500 for booth space and expenses at the New York International Gift Fair, where these products will be formally introduced in August 2012.
- $12,000 to increase capacity at the Funky Junk Center in Cambodia and to import the initial products to the US.
- $500 for the initial cost of warehouse space at CVR.
To thank you for your support of this project, we have developed a very cool list of perks, ranging from thanks and karma to Funky Junk doo-dads to exclusive funky junk product designs all the way up to unique tours of Cambodia!
And for that support, we humbly tell you now: "Thank you thank you thank you."
In developing countries, where garbage collection services are minimal and environmental awareness takes second place to basic survival, plastic bags are everywhere: clogging drains, choking animals, and blighting already difficult lives.
The community groups Funky Junk works with are carefully selected to ensure that they are capable of self-management after a training and implementation period. A local project manager is backed by the Funky Junk co-operative board, made up of a team of voluntary advisors with business and NGO backgrounds.
