"We take the 'OO' out of poo."-Great Elephant Poo Poo Paper Company
Having your first VMA acceptance speech hijacked by Kanye West? Stinks. Having "you lie" heckled at you while delivering your address to Congress? Stinks, too. Paper made from elephant waste? (Didn't see that coming, huh?). Surprisingly...does not stink. When I first read about the creative eco-paper products in this month's Ode Magazine; two thoughts immediately entered my mind: 1) Ewwh! and 2) How in the world? So, for those skeptical like me (I have since become a believer), here's the skinny.
As anyone who has ever been to a zoo or circus knows, there is A LOT of elephant dung in this world. It is a natural resource that usually goes to waste. So, to put all this waste to use, the Great Elephant Poo Poo Paper Company creates and sells products that take creative sustainability to a whole new level.
Elephant dung is full of short and medium-grain fibers (from the elephant's vegetarian diet of grass, bamboo and fruit), an ideal raw material for the paper-making process. The company (and this is where you should be lucky you are the consumer and not the creator), collects naturally dried elephant dung from elephant conservation parks and then processes it (including boiling the fibers to make sure everything is super clean) to make them into the lovely (and yes, completely odorless and sanitary) journals, cards and stationary pictured above. The paper is acid-free and linen like. Tree-huggers rejoice: a single elephant dropping can provide enough eco-friendly paper for 10 journal covers. The benefits: pretty paper, saving trees, a reliable and renewable resource for paper products and even a boon to the economies of elephant-heavy countries like Sri Lanka.
The Great Elephant Poo Poo Paper Company offers quite a collection of elegant handmade products in their Pootique with a simple blank design or my favorite: the elephant silhouette. The company also creates elephant poo roses for Valentine's Day. The journals and stationary sets are under $16 and the best part is a portion of the profits from your purchase is donated to elephant welfare and conservation programs. With that, the sustainable cycle continues and no one can poo poo on that. So there you go: clean, pretty paper made from poo. And you thought I was full of...well..you know.
-image source: poopoopaper.com, billia.files.wordpress.com
-SD
4 Minutes to save the world? More like 4 minutes to SMELL the world!
Really cool stuff SD. Like these kinds of earth friendly trends. Hey, would supporters of products like these be called "poo huggers"?
Posted by: Lettuceman | September 15, 2009 at 10:27 PM
I think I'm going to become a poo hugger!
Posted by: Monica | September 16, 2009 at 02:19 PM
This is a really neat concept! Can you buy these products in any of the mainstream stores or only from their website?
Posted by: Ami | September 16, 2009 at 10:18 PM
I think I have seen these products at the paper store in Mockingbird Station for those in the Dallas area.
Posted by: Rdub | September 16, 2009 at 10:45 PM