Profiles in Textile and Carpet Recycling, Summer 2004

Los Angeles Fiber Company

by Maggie Coulter

Started in 1983 by Ron Greitzer and his father Stan, the Los Angeles Fiber Company’s motto is “Saving our Planet, one Square at a Time.” Ron Greitzer was born into the fiber filling business. His grandfather, Jack Bayer, started Reliance Upholstery Supply Company in 1931 to make filling materials for the mattress and soft furniture industries. In its beginnings, LA Fiber made textile “shoddy” for Reliance’s new line of carpet padding using scraps from the then-huge textile industry in Los Angeles. (Greitzer explains that the term “shoddy” refers to undetermined fiber; it is a filling made from putting textiles through machinery that shreds it into fiber strands and fluffs it.)

“LA Fiber’s feedstock changed during the late 1990s as more and more of the garment industry migrated out of the country,” notes Greitzer. “Ninety percent of the textile cut-and-sew businesses left in 1998 with the passage of NAFTA.”

Then Greitzer made a discovery that more than made up for the loss of the preconsumer feedstock from the textile industry. One day he was watching as workers were unloading textile clippings. The clippings came in bales with cardboard or used carpet scraps tied around the outside. He saw one of the workers feeding the textile material into the processing machine and then tossing in the carpet scraps when he got to the end of the bale. “I told him to stop,” says Greitzer, “I said he couldn’t throw those carpet scraps in. The guy laughed and said he’d been doing that for 15 years. Suddenly I realized here was new feedstock—used carpet.”

There was plenty of used carpet being thrown away at area transfer stations and landfills. “In 2002, 4.7 billion pounds of carpet waste was landfilled,” notes Greitzer. “In California, carpet is about 4 percent by volume of the waste stream.” Processing carpet required equipment and process modifications at LA Fiber. With a loan from the California Integrated Waste Management Board’s Recycling Market Development Zone program, Greitzer was able to buy the equipment he needed.

“Today, Reliance is the only company in the world that makes a synthetic carpet cushion [pad] from 100 percent postconsumer waste carpet fibers,” says Greitzer. “This is in addition to their 100 percent preconsumer line.” However, as Greitzer explained, “offering a 100 percent postconsumer recycled product has involved trying to educate carpet companies AND their customers.”

Greitzer has developed marketing and supply programs with some of the largest carpet yarn producers (Dupont, Honeywell, Solutia). LA Fibers also offers a recycle program to carpet dealers and installers to divert their waste carpet and purchase his synthetic carpet pad made from that waste. “We are working on getting the major box retailers to carry this recycled product. Currently their products are either made from virgin petroleum-based materials or from preconsumer material, but not postconsumer. In reality, making products from preconsumer waste is not recycling as companies have been using postindustrial products for years—this stuff has not been going to the landfill.”

“We are keeping carpet out of the landfill,” explains Greitzer. “In the first half of this year we processed 20 million pounds of used carpet—all of that would have gone into the landfill. What has to happen is that retailers and dealers need to share in the responsibility of finding a home for products made from postconsumer carpet. Major carpet mills have to take charge and help educate consumers about the advantages of using products made from postconsumer content. And we need consumers to ask for postconsumer padding. If they ask for postconsumer, stores will supply it.”

Processing the materials starts with the delivery of used carpet in trailers to the facility. These are unloaded in 15 minutes by one of the plant’s 54 employees. The used carpet comes from transfer stations and installers. LA Fiber workers sort the carpet by hand and check it with infrared technology to verify the type of material it is made from: nylon 6, nylon 6.6, polypropylene, polyester, or wool. The carpet pieces are then put through a machine which removes the dirt and hard backing. Next the material goes through a series of machines multiple times to break it apart into fiber strands; the carpet goes through three times more than textile material. The resulting shoddy is made into carpet pads by adding latex and then heating to melt the latex so that it will bond the fibers together.

In assessing the cost of new versus recycled material, Greitzer notes that it is more expensive to process recycled feedstock than virgin materials. "The savings is on the raw materials," he explains. "The recycled material is cheaper so that offsets the higher production expense so the end product costs the same whether the feedstock was recycled or virgin."

Ron and his management team are always on the lookout for recycling opportunities. One of his drivers was at the landfill and saw a company throwing away large bundles of polyester fiber; he told them to bring it to LA Fiber instead. Now that company saves disposal costs and LA Fiber has additional feedstock to use for fiber fill.

Greitzer is proud of his work. Acknowledging there have been many ups and downs, he smiles and says, "If I can take or keep these valuable commodities out of the landfills and make a good product out of them, at the end of the day, I have made my contribution to our society."

Contact Information:
Ronald J. Greitzer,
President
Los Angeles Fiber Company
5190 Santa Fe Avenue
Vernon, CA 90058
(323) 589-5637 Fax: (323) 588-0424
sales@lafiber.com
www.lafiber.com

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Last updated: August 01, 2008