Watson Gloves have come out with a new range of work gloves that are made from 25% recycled plastic bottles.
Made from “WasteNot” material, the new Watson Stealth Hero gloves use a 15g polyester knit mix that incorporates recycled PET plastic to create the back of the gloves, along with a padded nitrile palm.
The gloves should be available for purchase this spring, but there are no details yet on USA availability or pricing. There are a couple of Canadian listings, pricing the new gloves at $7 to $10 CAD per pair.
Watson also offers a range of biodegradable disposable gloves that was available on Amazon, so hopefully these will also be sold there as well. I say was available because the current COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a lot gloves and other PPE supplies selling out.
Price: $19.95
Discussion
The new Watson Stealth Hero are a nice looking pair of gloves, and I would love to try them out. However, that’s not really the point in this post; what really intrigues me is the use of recycled plastic bottles. Watson Gloves claim to be the first in the industry to produce gloves using this material.
They take recycled plastic bottles and process them into chips, which are incorporated into the yarn that is made to produce the gloves. While this isn’t a brand new process, it appears to be the first time it’s been used in the production of work gloves.
Let’s face it, there’s no disputing the fact that we’re creating a lot of plastic waste as a species. For me, it’s a no-brainer to take this waste, repurpose it and incorporate it into a new product. The more products that do this, the more demand there will be for the raw material, which will result in more investment into the entire industry. That’s good news for our planet.
I would love to see major players in the industry set an example and start to introduce recycled plastic into their products. I see no reason for Dewalt or Milwaukee not to start introducing recycled plastic into their products. Even if they started with 1%, and committed to adding more every year, it would generate demand for the raw material and would inject significant investment into the entire industry.
So what do you think -are you prepared to pay a little premium for products like this?
