Two Brothers, a Dream, and Lots of Trash
Matty and Jonny are two brothers who grew up in the Uk. Their shared love for creativity, adventure, and spending time outdoors forged a deep friendship that has lasted a lifetime.
Growing up, we’d spend all our time in the forest, collecting wood to make bows, swords and dens. And that love of making never really left us. But as we got older, it naturally took more of a back seat as we became busier with our day to day lives (Brother's Make, n.d.).
Over time, the duo grew up and took on more responsibilities. Spending time apart in separate careers, the brothers missed their time as kids, spending their days together creating things they loved. Eventually they reconvened to create something fun and having a positive impact on the world.
Fast forward and we now have a small, but awesome team behind us and are running a business that we are just stupidly proud of. We’re still very much in the early days, but we’re producing content that is being viewed by millions, seeing people adopt our techniques and shift their perceptions on plastic waste.
The business "Brother's Make" and accompanying YouTube sell recycled objects while teaching others how to make and sell their own. For them, it's about having fun and spreading positivity while handling a serious issue. Similar to Joseph's goal with Marble Plastics, Brother's Make take a complex industrial process and translates this into a fun craft that anyone can learn.
We’re working with some truly future-focused companies in a number of different ways, be it sponsoring our videos or designing and manufacturing ranges of recycled plastic products for them. And we have our own product line that is developing and growing by the day, so that we can give more and more people the option to ditch single-use plastics and move towards a truly circular economy.
All of our products are made from 100% recycled plastic. All the materials that we use are collected by our wonderful friends, family, the local community, businesses and schools.
Each of their products are unique, featuring a swirling blends of color that stand out from monochromatic alternatives. Most of their products are small handheld items like carabiners, combs, boxes, and coasters. On their YouTube channel, Matt and Johnny show in detail their manufacturing process.
We meticulously clean every piece of plastic that comes to us before hand-sorting it by type and colour. This is by far the longest part of the process, and while it’s by no means the funnest, it is absolutely critical to ensure it is both safe to recycle as well as let the product be recycled again and again in the future.
On their website, the brothers also summarize their process into simple to understand graphics. While the above flowchart is linear, the Brother's admit the importance of circularity across their content and encourage others to think about the impact of the products they use on a daily basis.
So why do we do it? Well our all-time goal is to help individuals and communities become actively engaged in creating a more sustainable, conscious world, driven by a truly circular economy.
Further, the Brothers recognize the scale and complexity of plastic pollution. At the same time, they never want shame people for using plastics or dramatize the issue beyond what someone can handle.
To do this, we need to educate, encourage and entertain as many people as we possibly can so that we can all change our relationship with consumption and plastic waste. But we’re not here to guilt-trip people into changing their ways, that’s not really our style. While it’s an extremely serious issue, that doesn’t mean we’re going to be super serious - where’s the fun in that?
References
Brothers Make. (n.d.). About. https://www.brothersmake.com/about
