We destroy and recycle both technical and non-technical personal protection equipment materials, including common body armor materials like Kevlar®, Twaron®, and Zylon®. We honor strict material logging and tracking methods for the destruction of aged soft body armor as well as other time-sensitive and damaged ballistic materials.

In addition, though technical material deconstruction is our specialty, we do not limit ourselves to the destruction and recycling of only these materials — we also work with several other materials such as nylon, PC, PC/ABS, PE, and PET materials.

We work as a conduit between both law and military organizations (which need to surrender used and out-of-date body armor) and manufacturing companies (which can recycle and reuse the ballistics materials after we have destroyed the body armor). As such, we work with a variety of companies and organizations, from Teijin Aramid to the Baton Rouge, Sacramento, and Atlanta police departments — among many others. We also support a number of charitable organizations, including the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, the Ottawa Hills Schools Foundation, the Muscular Dystrophy Association of America, the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, the YMCA, the Wounded Warrior Project, Oceana, WildAID, the Toledo Museum of Art, The Children’s Heart Foundation, and the USO. We help to provide funding and materials for various projects for these organizations.

All body armor and ballistic material is destroyed — it will no longer be used as personal protective equipment, and our Certificate of Destruction ensures that you have proof of the material destruction.

Throughout the process, we’ll coordinate with you to ensure that an accurate chain of custody (CoC) document is rendered. We’ll create a paper trail recording the transfer of your body armor to our possession, as well as the destruction of the body armor, and we’ll provide you with an accurate CoC document and Certificate of Destruction in receipt of our service. We also use an Enrollment, Receipt, and Destruction Request form to begin the process, ensuring that you can safely ship your body armor and ballistics materials to our processing facility.

After destroying the body armor and ballistics materials that we receive, we recycle all leftover materials that can be reclaimed. Reclaimed materials are often useful and valuable, and can be recycled through partnering companies. For instance, leftover fiber from a ballistics vest may end up as a set of gloves after it is recycled and used in production. Our ballistic materials and technical materials often become brake pads, boat ropes, and tire treads, among other things.

We believe that body armor should remain in the right hands. That’s why we strive to ensure that outdated, damaged body armor is destroyed, where it may be reused as recycled materials. Fiber Brokers provides the secure deconstruction and recycling of ballistic body armor, so that you can rest assured your personal protective equipment and ballistics materials don’t make their way into the hands of criminals. In addition, we want to ensure that your PPE and ballistics materials aren’t reused when they are rendered ineffective — which may be hazardous to any user. Destroying these materials is the best option to ensure that body armor remains in the right hands, and only effective body armor remains in service.

In addition, due to the broad disposal issues related to ballistic body armor, we provide safe and documented deconstruction services to law enforcement and military agencies — you can rest assured that your body armor and ballistics materials have been successfully destroyed. You will be sent documentation proving that we received your materials and have destroyed them responsibly.

The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) has provided a publication, Guide to Body Armor, which lays out standards surrounding body armor procurement, use, and disposal for law enforcement and military applications. In their guide, they describe their standards for the disposal of body armor:

“When body armor is no longer serviceable, the agency must dispose of it in a responsible manner that should also prevent illicit use. If armor is disposed of in a landfill, unauthorized parties may obtain the armors; also, materials may not be biodegradable. Many materials used in manufacturing body armor are either fire retardant or inherently fireproof, so they cannot be incinerated. Certain material suppliers have ongoing recycling programs for out-of-service armor. Some body armor companies offer a “take-back” disposal. The agency should contact its armor supplier/manufacturer to see if quotes are provided for such services. You may also contact the NIJ CTP regarding possibly donating the armor for research purposes. Refer to the resource list in Appendix B for NIJ CTP contact information. When an agency disposes of unserviceable armors, it should require and obtain a record of disposition from the organization used to dispose of the armor. At a minimum, the disposition should list the armor by serial number, disposal method and disposal date. This chain of custody document should be retained by both the agency and the disposing company as a formal record of disposition.”

The NIJ is a branch of the U.S. Department of Justice, and they set standards which aim to reduce crime while improving the justice system. According to their site, the NIJ is “dedicated to improving knowledge and understanding of crime and justice issues through science. We provide objective and independent knowledge and tools to inform the decision-making of the criminal and juvenile justice communities to reduce crime and advance justice, particularly at the state and local levels.“

For our particular applications, we rely on the NIJ for their standards surrounding body armor disposal, which are listed above.