Kalamazoo salon ships hair clippings to nonprofit to help environment

Hair clippings converted into mats and tubes to soak up oil spills? You heard that right. A Kalamazoo salon is sending more than a few hanks of hair to a group that helps turn the clippings into effective tools for relief efforts in disasters like the recent oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico.

Blue 302 Salon and Spa fills a 3-foot by 1-foot by 1-foot receptacle full of hair at the end of each week. Rather than toss it out, that hair now is shipped at Blue 302's expense to Matter of Trust, a 12-year-old San Francisco-based nonprofit organization that connects other nonprofits in need with in-kind donations.

Victoria Elkins, a Blue 302 employee suggested the move after reading about the initiative.

Excerpt:

"We just think it's going to be great for the environment," Elkins said. "Everybody here, we're all animal lovers and some of us are a little bit more rabid about the environment than others."

She was excited about the idea of helping with spills that result from such incidents as the early April Chinese boat crash at Australia's Great Barrier Reef and last week's oil rig explosion off the shores of New Orleans.

For more on the Reuse Of Society's Abundance program, read the entire story.

Source: Kalamazoo Gazette