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When it comes to keeping things eco-friendly, Big Tech has stayed conspicuously out of the loop. Though there have been encouraging shifts in the way that historically huge polluters like the food, auto, and fashion industries approach production, Silicon Valley has continued to operate with little regard for tech’s wastefulness.

The environmental footprint of consumer tech, a $1.5 trillion industry, is staggering. Of the billion or so active iPhones in the world, according to Apple’s latest earnings report, less than 1% are recycled. And that’s just one product. Much of our disused gadgets eventually make it to developing countries, such as India and China, where sprawling dumps of electronic waste, known as e-waste, continue to grow ever higher.

Helping reduce such waste is a key mission of Nimble, an eco-conscious electronics brand launched last year in southern California. The idea for Nimble was seeded for its founders during a walk through the aisles of the Consumer Electronics Show, a massive trade show in Las Vegas, in 2017, and not finding a single “truly mission driven brand,” according to co-founder Ross Howe . “No one in the space was talking about the impact that technology was having on the environment,” he says. Co-founder Kevin Malinowski adds, “It’s a dirty secret that gets brushed under the rug and ignored.”

With the advent of do-good, direct-to-consumer brands like Toms, Allbirds, and The Honest Company, the pair asked themselves, why is tech not even talking about sustainability when every other industry is talking about it?

In launching an electronics company, the Nimble team was not starting from scratch. The three founders—Howe, Malinowski, and Jon Bradley—had all been on the founding team of Mofie, a company specializing in wireless phone chargers. In five years, Howie says, they grew the company to $350 million in revenue before selling it to the online electronics retailer Zag in 2016.

Now, two years later, using recycled materials made in Chinese factories that are heavily vetted for eco- and labor-friendly practices, Nimble is quickly gaining steam as a provider of not just green electronics, but high-quality ones as well. “Nimble’s stuff is actually very, very nice,” judged Wired magazine.

ITEM

Nimble has four product categories: portable chargers, wireless chargers, fast charge kits, and its newest, phone cases. The brand’s chargers, which include 10k, 13k, 20k, and 26k mAh models, are sleek, fashionable items, made with plant-based bioplastic, wholly recycled aluminum, and hemp-based fabric, with specks of mica doppling the dock. The phone cases—for iPhones 11, X, XS, XS Max and XR—are offered in a multitude of colors, with a soft yet grippy texture; they are made 100% from plastic bottles. Nimble’s wireless chargers, which consist of a rounded square pad covered in soft fabric, work speedily, and even charge through cases.

Nimble's phone cases are made 100% from plastic bottles. Nimble

PRICE

While more expensive than budget competitors, Nimble is priced fairly competitively compared to legacy brands. The wireless chargers go for between $40 and $60, while the portable ones go for between $50 and $100. The phone cases cost around $40. Though its founders intend to eventually move into retail stores, Nimble’s products are now only available online.

WHAT’S THE GOOD?

Beyond employing nearly 100% sustainable and recycled materials in its production, Nimble also provides, in each package, a baggy in which consumers may deposit some of their own e-waste. Print out a free shipping form from Nimble’s website and send the baggy back, and up to a pound of e-waste is recycled through Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles, a non-profit that employs mostly former convicts.

To solidify its eco-cred, Nimble has undergone the rigorous assessment process provided by Certified B-Corp, a watchdog group.

Nimble is also a member of One Percent for the Planet, which confirms that the company funnels 1% of its revenues back into environmental initiatives. They also take care to green-ify its packaging, ensuring that each component—from the recycled (recyclable) scrap paper box to the soy-based ink—is eco-friendly. (Big Tech, with all its metallic finishing and plastic wrap, is notorious for its wasteful packaging.) “If you think of who has the shiniest boxes, it’s always the tech industry,” Howe grumbles.

WHAT’S NEXT

Ultimately, Nimble aims to “expand into as many product categories as possible,” Howe says. “We really want to become a personal tech brand.”

There are new products coming, though Howe and Malinowski are tight-lipped on exactly what. Above all, Malinowski adds, they hope that Nimble will inspire other companies “to follow suit” and stop being so wasteful.

“It’s hard to fathom the scale in which we are dumping these poisonous products in landfills,” Malinowski says. “Our goal is to have Nimble not be so remarkable in the tech space.”