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This Flourissant-Based Brand is Repurposing Feedbags
Women With a (Re)Purpose: Beyond chicken feed
Eric Peterson //July 2, 2019//
This Flourissant-Based Brand is Repurposing Feedbags
Women With a (Re)Purpose: Beyond chicken feed
Eric Peterson //July 2, 2019//
Repurposing often begins with one's own waste stream. Take Caitlin Paul of Farmhouse Feedbags in Florissant. She started making a few tote bags from empty sacks of feed for her chickens in 2016. Friends encouraged her to start a business, and she now sells her bags at farmers markets and through Etsy.
"I got involved with repurposing because, truthfully, I fell in love with the pictures on the feedbags that we bought," Paul says. "The hen on the front looked like one of our favorite chickens, so I couldn't resist the idea of turning it into a bag that would last. I also hated throwing away feedbags that could be used for something else."
Paul estimates she diverts "at least 1,000 a year from the landfill" and has a steady supply from friends and neighbors who give her feedbags emptied by their llamas, horses, pigs and goats. "I can say that my life these past few years has never been without a pile of bags on my porch waiting to be reused," she says.
She's moved into computer bags, purses and aprons as Farmhouse Feedbags goes worldwide. "Some have gone to Africa and Scotland, as well as all across the U.S.," Paul says.
This article is part of a series called Women With a (Re)Purpose, which covers the enterprising women in Colorado that are transforming the waste stream into a supply chain for a wide range of products, while reshaping public perception in the process.
