LMB is a family run
business, founded by Lawrence and Joy Barry who still work alongside their son
and daughter who run the business now.
LMB was established in 1985 and since then moved on from only buying clothes & textiles, which would be sorted and cut into wipers to also reusing clothes that are still usable and in good condition.
„...with the event of the affluent eighties, people were no longer throwing out clothes because they were old and tatty but because they were out of fashion.“ [1]
Lawrence and Joy saw a
potential market in exporting second hand clothes to developing countries, where
there was not an established high intensity textile industry that could produce affordable
clothes for the people living in those countries.
The second hand market in
the UK was also changing as charities started to take a role in the clothes
recycling industry. They set up shops to sell clothes donated from the public.
LMB teamed up with Barnardo´s and collected unsold clothing from all their
shops in South East England & they soon put recycling banks on public
streets.
The banks encouraged people to recycle and the banks were such a success that LMB was able to expand. LMB works with various charities and has its own clothes collection banks on the streets, which are produced and refurbished by LMB´s subsidiary company “LMB Fabrication“.
LMB´s head-quarters are
based in Canning Town where the collected clothes, shoes and other textiles are
sorted and baled.
„LMB reuses and recycles virtually every kind of textile, from t-shirts to saris to school uniforms, shoes, trainers, football kits, hats, belts, jackets. The list is endless.“[2]
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(1) www.lmb.co.uk/lmbstory.html
(2) www.lmb.co.uk/recycle.html