Unifi manufactures multi-filament polyester and nylon textured yarns for global textile solutions. Repreve® is the company’s recycled brand of fiber transforming recycled plastic bottles into products and clothing used every day.
Unifi participates in Outdoor Retailer in order to gain greater brand awareness and new manufacturing customers for Repreve®. A wide range of products can be produced from the fiber. Examples include tote bags, mattress covers and safety gates. Currently, more than 50 clothing manufacturers, including recognizable names such as Adidas, Quicksilver, Haggar Clothing, and Timberland, offer clothing made from Repreve®.
Research indicates one million plastic bottles are brought around the world every minute. To demonstrate the recycling process, Exhibitus arranged an interactive exhibit design showing how bottles are gathered, broken down and then developed into Repreve®. With energy conservation and sustainability at the heart of their story, Unifi was looking for a way to grab the attention of companies who would use the fiber in manufacturing process.
One of the outside walls of the custom trade show exhibit was used for the interactive display. At the beginning of the story, there were LED lights placed in plastic bottles hanging in the corner of the display. The LED lights changed from blue to green, reflecting Unifi’s branding and attracting the attention of show attendees as they passed by. There were also round display containers holding forms of the plastic – flakes and chips – produced during the process. Spindles of yarn were then mounted to the display, giving an attendee the ability to touch the product.
Outlines of a hand print were strategically placed on the graphic with proximity sensors mounted beneath them. When an attendee's hand hovered over an outlined hand print, light and sound were produced, which then triggered a short video on a nearby monitor explaining the manufacturing process.