One Rope. 30 Keyrings. And 20 Prototypes Before That.

One retired climbing rope is about 30 keyrings. Or a belt, a dog lead, and still some left over.

That is the bit people never guess right. They see a coil of dead rope in the corner of a climbing wall and think it is one thing. It is about thirty things.

I get the same two questions every single week. How are they made. And where does the rope come from. So here is the honest answer to both, no polish on it.

Where the rope actually comes from

Climbing walls, mostly. Transition Extreme here in Aberdeen. Climb Scotland. A growing pile of walls up and down the country who now put their retired rope in a bag for me instead of a skip.

Then there are individual climbers. People post me their old ropes. A rope arrives in a jiffy bag with a wee note saying what it did. That never stops being brilliant.

Every rope I get is still strong. That is the thing folk misunderstand. A rope gets retired after 5 to 10 years because the core wears in ways you cannot see from the outside. It is not safe with a person on the end of it any more. It is absolutely fine holding your keys, your dog, or your trousers up.

Ask your wall what happens to theirs. Genuinely. Most staff have never been asked and most of them hate binning it.

How climbing rope belts are made, the unglamorous version

Fifteen to twenty rounds of prototyping per product. Packaging included. That number surprises people and I understand why, because a belt looks simple.

It is not simple. The buckle has to sit right on the weave. The stitch has to bite without cutting the sheath. The end has to be finished so it does not fray in month four. Every one of those is a round of getting it wrong first.

Then I stress test it. Properly. I pull on it until something breaks, and then I go and fix whatever broke.

Because here is the thing. A climbing rope belt that fails is just a worse belt. Nobody is going to forgive a snapped buckle because the rope had a nice story. The story only counts if the thing works.

Why I bang on about the yield

Because thirty keyrings from one bin bag is the whole argument in one number.

Nylon rope takes hundreds of years to break down. One rope costs about 46.6 kg of CO2 to make in the first place. That cost is already paid. Binning it after five years wastes every bit of it.

So the maths is not complicated. One rope, thirty small useful objects, and a landfill that does not get another lump of nylon. In January this year alone we kept over 5 km of rope out of the ground.

Have a look at the recycled climbing rope keychains if you want the cheapest way in, or the recycled climbing rope belts made to your exact waist size, 22 to 50 inches. The gifts for climbers collection is where most folk start when they are buying for someone else.

Less waste. More miles.

Stay classy and remember,
Make Waste Useful.

George