This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost Australia, which closed in 2021.

How You Can Give Your Old Clothes To H&M For Recycling

...and get a discount voucher for your troubles.
This could be the perfect excuse to clean out your wardrobe.
Shanna Camilleri Unsplash
This could be the perfect excuse to clean out your wardrobe.

H&M first launched its worldwide Garment Collecting initiative in 2013 and has since collected over 40,000 tonnes of clothing -- pretty impressive, huh?

The whole premise is this -- each year tonnes of clothes and textiles end up in landfills, but as much as 95 percent could be used again. The H&M garment collecting initiative has been created to decrease this waste and 'close the fashion loop'.

Not many customers know they can take any unwanted garments and textiles -- not just from H&M but from any brand and in any condition -- to any H&M store, all year around.

Why take your stuff to H&M as a opposed to the charity bin down the road? Well, firstly (and selfishly), if you take a bag to H&M to be recycled you'll get a 15 percent discount voucher to use off your next purchase.

Secondly, and this might come as a surprise to some, but a huge amount of the stuff we donate to Vinnie's and put in charity bins isn't of any use. It all ends up in landfill, instead, which was kinda what you were trying to avoid.

H&M have a goal, which is to increase the amount of garments collected every year so that the retail giant reaches a total collected volume of 25,000 tonnes per year by 2020.

2017's recycling campaign is called "Bring It" and there's a film to go with it that tells the journey which unwanted garments go on after they have been collected in store. The film illustrates how the lifespan of a garment can be increased to keep it in the loop for as long as possible.

ALSO ON HUFFPOST AUSTRALIA

Close
This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost Australia. Certain site features have been disabled. If you have questions or concerns, please check our FAQ or contact support@huffpost.com.