Apparel Impact: Top Textile Recycler Does Well by Doing Good
October 20, 2026
Ten years ago, Joe was a U.S. Army veteran raising a young family in Manchester, N.H. with an idea for a new business. He built and painted wooden recycling bins with his kids in their driveway, talked customers into hosting the bins in parking lots, and encouraged people to start dropping off used clothing into the bin. Joe would stack bags he’d collected next to the lawn mower in his shed.
Today, Apparel Impact collects clothing, shoes, and accessories through its 1,850 drop-off locations and gives every item its highest use. Wearable pieces are reused, resold into secondhand markets or put back into the community, while items too worn to wear are upcycled into new products or recycled into raw materials like fibers and insulation, keeping textiles out of landfills.
Joe’s business is one of the largest in the country — and he’s working to make the industry more accountable and effective.
Joe started Apparel Impact in 2015 with one, big number in his head: 34 billion.
That’s how many pounds of textiles (clothing, shoes, sheets, towels, and accessories) were ending up in landfills in the U.S. It’s one of the fastest-growing waste streams.
“What’s becoming very apparent is that we produce too much clothing as a country; we purchase too much,” he said. “What can we do to make it into something new, to be reused again, rather than [have] it end up in the trash?”
Joe and his father and co-founder, Ken, wanted to start a business recycling textiles discarded in New Hampshire to help minimize environmental harm and ensure people never go without the clothing they need — a triple bottom line.
Within two years of launching the company, Joe knew he had a business model that worked, except for the handmade collection bins.
“The demand was there but we couldn’t keep building bins,” he said. “They’re made of wood — they’re not going to last long.”
Joe started looking for a loan but heard “no” after “no.” Traditional banks didn’t consider his existing bins as collateral, and he didn’t have the history or data they needed to back up his vision.
The New Hampshire Community Loan Fund felt different.
“You were the first lender to ever believe in us,” he remembered. “Even during that beginning stage, you guys were there to help.”
Thanks to our “neighbors-investing-in-neighbors” model that turns investments and donations into loans and coaching for small business owners, we loaned Joe $25,000 to purchase 20 steel collection bins. Within a few years, Apparel Impact began averaging 20 to 25 percent growth annually.
Today, Apparel Impact has grown from two to 50 employees working at warehouses in New Hampshire and New York.
The business recycled 20.6 million pounds (that’s 10,300 tons) of textiles last year — conserving more than 14 billion gallons of water, saving more than 617 million kW hours of energy, and eliminating the use of nearly 200,000 pounds of harmful chemicals associated with textile manufacturing.
Joe and his team have also launched multiple new mission-driven initiatives along the way, including:
William “Bill” Kittredge was Joe’s first driver and is now Apparel Impact’s Brand Ambassador.
“It was nice being here from the beginning because those core values are something that I treasure,” Bill said. “Our programs and how we’re really giving back to each of the towns that partner with us shows our maturity in the industry... we have the right answers.”
Joe is a leader who embraces change — and mistakes.
“The biggest mistakes I count as our biggest blessings,” he explained. “When you’re in the mode of ‘things are going well,’ that’s the most dangerous because that means you’re not taking any chances.”
That mindset has been helpful over the last few years as his business, and the larger textile recovery sector, experienced the effects of global conflicts and disruption to supply chains.
Apparel Impact has evolved from simply collecting textiles to sorting, grading, upcycling, and serving as an intermediary in the movement of textiles across the U.S.
“We’re trying to branch out and do many different things within the realm of reuse and recycling to secure us — but also to help us grow in different areas,” Joe said.
The company recently gained attention for its new brands in the upcycling space: The Alpine Collection and Inherit Vintage.
Apparel Impact partnered with The Drift Collective, a Portsmouth, N.H.-based upcycling brand that repairs, recreates, and sells secondhand clothing, to reclaim outdoor clothing from ski resorts and create durable new gear. Loon Mountain debuted sling bags made from discarded ski team jackets in its store this winter.
Joe hopes to add upcycling partnerships with other businesses and organizations in the future.
If discarded textiles are common in dumpsters, vintage clothing (clothing more than 20 years old) is at the opposite end of the scale.
Vintage clothing represents 1% of all used clothing in the country, according to Joe. But not at Apparel Impact.
“We have about 9,000 pieces of vintage, and once we actually go through them and list them, it'll make us one of the largest vintage brands in the country,” Joe said.
We support local businesses because of the greater impact they have on communities. They are the source of jobs and often are central gathering places that provide much more than goods and services.
Businesses like Apparel Impact are the heart of their communities. Investing in them brings returns that go far beyond their economic impact, even after loans are repaid.
collection bins in 2016
bins in 2026
employees in 2016
employees in 2026
pounds of textiles collected and recycled in 2016
pounds of textiles expected to be recycled in 2026
people in need who received clothing in 2016
total people in need who have received clothing
Apparel Impact at a Glance:
Headquarters: Hooksett, N.H.
CEO: Joseph Whitten
Founders: Joseph Whitten and his father, Kenneth Whitten
Founding year: 2015
Mission: Changing the way we think about clothing.
Brands: Inherit Vintage; The Alpine Collection, in partnership with The Drift Collective
Where to find Apparel Impact Bins: Learn more on the website.
To help small business owners get the coaching they need to be successful and sustainable, please make a donation or contact us at info@communityloanfund.org to learn how you can make a difference in your community.