Today, Reebok officially launched the first footwear product from its “Cotton + Corn” sustainable products initiative. The brand announced the environmentally conscious program last year.
Sustainability is the focus of Reebok latest installment of footwear, the Reebok NPC Cotton + Corn.
Rather than using oil to create synthetic materials, Reebok has grown its latest batch of shoes from the ground up. The shoes use cotton to create a functional upper while corn makes up the tooling. The shoe has insoles that are derived from castor bean oil and comes in packaging that is 100% recycled.
“Most athletic footwear is made using petroleum to create synthetic rubber and foam cushioning systems,” said Bill McInnis, Head of Reebok Future, in a statement. “With 20 billion pairs of shoes made every year, this is not a sustainable way of making footwear. At Reebok, we thought ‘what if we start with materials that grow, and use plants rather than oil-based materials?’ By using sustainable resources as our foundation, and then through ongoing testing and development, we were able to create a plant-based sneaker that performs and feels like any other shoe.”
Interestingly, the Reebok NPC UK Cotton + Corn retails for $95 — meaning shoe shoe has not received a large premium on its price for being environmentally friendly (unlike shoes from other brands). The shoe is available now in limited quantities, exclusively at Reebok.com/us/CottonandCorn.
“The NPC UK Cotton + Corn is the only footwear product on the market that has been certified as containing 75% USDA certified biobased content,” explained McInnis in a statement. “And this is just the start for us. We are on an ongoing path to create a different type of footwear — so that you can feel good about what you’re wearing and where it came from.”
Source: Reebok / Images courtesy of Reebok
