Rab Team member Hayden Jamieson climbs Freerider in a day

May 5, 2024 mountaingroup

You probably have one: a sleeping bag, a down jacket, or maybe your comforter or pillow is filled with down. If not, you’ve surely encountered an item filled with feathers at some point. Down has been used as an insulating fill for generations, keeping people warm at night and explorers alive in the coldest conditions.

But what happens to all of it once you're done? Where does it go?

We’ve been working with down since the beginning. The steps leading up to Rab's attic, where he was sewing his first sleeping bags, were speckled with white and gray from down clusters. Slowly we added technical down jackets to our range and over time we ended up mastering down insulation.

What is down?

Down is the fine layer of feathers that sits beneath a bird's tough outer feathers. These feathers are closest to the bird's body, are extremely light, and are a very effective means of trapping air.

Trapping air under a jacket or in a sleeping bag creates an incredibly effective thermal barrier, keeping us warm while in the mountains. That’s why our most technical insulation products are filled with down.

Another important benefit of down is that it is extremely packable, allowing alpinists and mountaineers to store the coat during the day without taking up a large amount of space in their backpack, and put them on when the temperature drops.

Down is a waste product.

Much of our down comes from the food industry as a byproduct of meat production. We only use duck and goose down in our products and since 2016 all our virgin down has been certified by the Responsible Down Standard, guaranteeing the welfare of the birds.

Goose down tends to be of higher quality, offering the best warmth-to-weight ratio, and we use it in our top-end products. It packs down more compactly, which is a great advantage when traveling fast and light.

Duck down clusters are smaller and not as warm in relation to weight, which makes them ideal for our more general use, everyday jackets, such as our classic Kinder Smock.

However, down is not a single-use material.

Down can be reused again and again, and recycled into new products once its initial function is over.

We started using recycled down in 2019 in our Horizon Down Hoodie. These days, we work with the team behind PURE recycled in an attempt to close the loop. You can find PURE recycled in our iconic Microlight jacket and the Axion Pro jackets.

In fact, in 2020 we saved 21,500 kilograms of down from going to landfill by using PURE recycled down.

Despite being such a good material to use and reuse, there are very few systems for recycling it. It has taken us a long time to find a supplier who can guarantee the high quality down we need to deliver the performance you expect from our gear.

So... where do all the old kilos of down go?
Unfortunately, the answer is to the landfill. But it doesn't have to be that way.

We are piloting a collection scheme in the UK, trying to close the loop.

We have built a down collection site at Rab's UK headquarters in Alfreton, Derbyshire. Here we collect spent products like down comforters, pillows, jackets, sleeping bags and other variants, before giving this valuable material a new life.

How do we recycle?

We are first piloting the scheme to smooth out the processes. But we have big plans to start expanding the scheme to all our distributors, including Mountain Group.

1. PURE® recycled down is sourced from post-consumer waste items such as duvets, pillows, and other down products.

2. Selected and sorted in Italy and then delivered to us, PURE® recycled down is currently the only down recycling company certified by the Global Recycling Standard.

3. The use of recycled down is a sustainable alternative to virgin down and helps reduce our environmental impact.