By now, you probably know how we feel about the whole sustainability thing, so we’ll save you the spiel. Here’s the cliff notes: trees = good, waste = bad. Boom. Now that we’re all on the same page, let’s keep this green train a-rollin’.


To us, moving production to the US also meant moving all of our sourcing and processes here as well. As a bunch of self-proclaimed tree-huggers, we wanted to find a sustainable new way to source our wooden spools right here in America – and we found it. We’re beyond excited that now, all of our spools are made from US birch wood, from sustainable birch farms in Maine, USA. 


We’ll get into the process a bit here because we think it’s pretty cool. Once our supplier in Maine gets our batch of birch together (say that five times fast), they put it into a machine called a lathe. This is where it gets interesting if you’re into history and US manufacturing. Lathe machines were created over 100 years ago for the creation of spools, until basically being phased out by the invention of plastic and the newer machines that used it. Ironically, these rugged beasts of machinery actually outperform newer spool-making machines by creating a 20-30% faster output. Lathe machines were a big part of the once-flourishing US textile industry. Dozens of small towns all over New England, especially Maine, are where the hub of this production happened in the US, outputting items like spools and bobbins, feeding the vast textile mills of New England.


Now, there’s only a few textile factories and mills like that scattered across the U.S., one of them being our new production facility. Here, they use American-made machinery, like the lathe (they’re well maintained we promise), to make American-made products like Whiskers Laces and the spools that hold them.


So to make a long story short, if you’re a patriotic tree hugger like us, every time you unspool your new laces, feel free to give them a tiny little hug. It’s basically the same thing.


Oh, and if you’re not using our spools to store your laces, find cool ways to repurpose them and tag us @whiskerslaces! You all are a creative bunch. And if you’re not using them, feel free to send them back to us and we’ll give them to some laces in need. Shoot us an email at hello@whiskerslaces.com for more info.
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