Edmonton Convention Centre partners with local business to create upcycled lanyards

The Edmonton Convention Centre launched an initiative to help keep lanyards from ending up in landfills. CTV News Edmonton's Amanda Anderson explains.

The Edmonton Convention Centre has partnered with a local small business to launch a new initiative aiming to keep lanyards from winding up at the landfill.

The centre has teamed up with Earth Warrior, a zero-waste recycling business, to create the Lanyard Library Program. Through the initiative, people hosting events are given the option of using lanyards made from upcycled textiles.

Katrina Hillyer, armed with her sewing machine, started Earth Warrior as a clothing upcycling business but said she later decided to expand.

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“I wanted to create items that people could use to reduce more waste,” she said in an interview Friday. “I started with reusable tote bags and grocery bags.”

Now, instead of the thousands of leftover lanyards from convention centre events ending up in the garbage, they go to Hillyer, who cleans and sanitizes them for their next use.

Parts of what she gets, like the hardware, often go to new reusable lanyards for new convention centre events.The rest of the materials are used as stuffing in the Earth Warrior yoga products Hillyer creates.

While the initiative is still new, Hillyer hopes next year’s events will be an opportune time for feedback on the project. She also hopes the partnership might mean more waste reduction initiatives for businesses in the city.

“(It’s) a small business, I can only make so much of a difference,” she said. “But the minute I get to start collaborating and working with other companies … that’s where I see real change happening because it’s becoming more mainstream.”