Over the past 3 years, I have been fascinated by how Juul products skyrocketed to mainstream success. I was always dumbfounded at how much money my friends spent on buying the juul itself ($40) plus the pods ($20 for a pack of 4). I thought about all the plastic that was just being wasted when they would throw out the caps on their juul pods so I started recycling them. I put them all in a mason jar. It wasn't really hard to fill the mason jar to the top. I would find them everywhere; in my friend's rooms, on the floor of my university, on the subway, and in other public spaces.
For a long time, I just kept the pods in the mason jar. I had no idea what I really wanted to do with them until I decided to make hair accessories. Initially, I had thought about making a satirical ad about Juul and their willingness to promote nicotine consumption among young people. This was really a reaction to their advertisements with popular influencers like Bella Hadid. This is an idea that I still am working on.
I focused on hair accessories because I knew they would be easy to sell with the recognition of the Juul name. I thought it would be something fun to do and a small gift for some of my friends who for years had provided me with the caps. I also thought since the juul pod caps are so colorful that it would be easy to make them into an accessory. The following images are what I produced. I used basic metal clips and hot glued the caps to the top of the clips. Overall, I had a very positive reaction from my network. I sold over 150+ clips.
While making the clips, I decided to make folders for each buyer. I used recycled photo envelopes to serve as the basis for the package. Then, I used old magazines to collage the front part of the envelope. I finished them off by applying glitter paper inside to hide the existing text. I also included customized notes for each customer. The following images are scanned versions of the envelopes as well as some photos.
