The story of plant-based phone case production Do you know that faint crackling sound of your brand-new phone hitting the pavement after you accidentally dropped it? You hear the crack, you pick up the phone, and you turn it around. A quick look, and there. The screen is busted. Chances are you’ve experienced something more or less like this. In fact, every single second two smartphone screens crack in the US alone, mostly as a result of drops. And some 40% of phones that break like this don’t get repaired at all, ending up as toxic electronic waste that’s difficult, if not impossible, to fully recycle. Phones are pretty great. They help us keep in touch with loved ones, they are our own personal portals to the world. But they are terribly resource-intensive to make, and they’re expensive to buy. And still, we fail to take care of them. Our mission is to make sensible and sustainable everyday products. And what could be more every day than a phone case? One that protects your phone is beautiful to look at, and one that, unlike most phone cases out there, is the phone case made in the most sustainable way conceivable. Challenge accepted - to make the most sustainable phone case. How we found the phone case factory? For our phone case, we were certain that we wanted to avoid harmful plastics. So we were looking for someone who was prepared to work with natural, renewable or biodegradable materials. Someone ready to test different blends with us until we found a biodegradable case with a high plant content and with the right characteristics to protect your phone. So, we spend considerable time sourcing suppliers until we found a small family-owned factory able to prepare our plant-based material. The factory is run by two gentlemen, one Swede and one Canadian, and specialises in making granulates. They receive the different raw materials and turn them into biodegradable plastic pellets, that we bag and ship to their final destination where we manufacture the phone cases. Just a short distance away, we found another family-owned manufacturing plant that agreed to take on our challenge. Needless to say, we really like this factory. It runs on solar power in summer and switches to hydroelectricity in winter, and has created a closed system for wastewater. Even though they specialise in plastic molding, they were very excited about working with plant-based materials and, with our help, a cutting edge robotic tooling process and a lot of trial and error, they were able to mould our pellets into eight different eco-friendly phone cases. Given that our unique compound has vastly different properties to traditional plastics (like how it reacts to heat), it took many attempts before we got it right, but we’re really proud of the result. But our story doesn’t end there. The phone cases also get beautiful prints from a nearby print shop. So there you are. With the help of our wonderful partners, just a short distance from where we live, we created one of the loveliest mobile phone cases, made with plants, here in Sweden. Our phone cases support circular economy: agood loop™ We could have just left it there. We managed to make eco-friendly phone cases by reducing the traditional petroleum-based plastics that ruin our environment. Why not take it further? Because we want to go the extra mile. You see, we don’t want our used phone cases to end up in the trash, alongside all the other stuff that we throw. And our phone cases are quite easy to recycle. With a tiny bit of processing, you’re able to turn them into pellets again, and feed these pellets into the moulding machine again. And make new phone cases. So that’s why we’re creating agood loop™. agood loop™ is a circular loop system that lets you swap your mobile case for a new one — at any time and for any reason. Maybe you like a new design, maybe you got yourself a new phone? Just go ahead and trigger your swap. We’ll make sure to recycle your mobile case and make you a new one. About the owners The Mobile Case Factory is a truly unique collaboration of local companies who are dedicated to working together for the benefit of each other, and our planet. Every one of these businesses receives fair wages, in addition to five weeks of paid vacation each year and an opt-in pension plan on top of that. As a result, everyone involved with this mobile case collective is able to make a living while also enjoying benefits that facilitate their personal lives and support financial security. Conclusion Who knew that an innovative mobile phone case can help bring sustainability to the world? agood phone case is a great example of how sustainability and the circular economy can come together. We simply can't ignore the positive impacts this solution can create for our planet and future generations. And, who knows— maybe this model will inspire other sustainable solutions!