Hi there, my name is Jason. This story starts out like many stories we have all read lately. “When the pandemic hit, I was laid off”. So, There I was at home trying my hardest to turn that into an opportunity for myself. I always knew I wanted to create a business around art in some way. I needed to make sure that whatever I did for a living was something I would love to do no matter what. Music has always been a passion of mine, so I began my research on what the music industry needed. It wasn’t long before I ran across a statement that was immediately seared into my brain. “One and half million POUNDS of strings from musical instruments find their way to landfills across the country EVERY YEAR”! Now up to that point I thought I knew what direction I was going but that single sentence re-routed my entire thought process. I was going to start a service for string musicians to help as much as I could to eradicate their musical footprints. I have been playing guitar for decades and never knew this was an issue. Turns out not a lot of people do, not even musicians. Then it all started happening. Name, done. Logo, done. Logistics, done. Within the next 6 or so months www.stringswap.us was live and running.

String Swap is a 100% eco-friendly, no hassle service created for string musicians to easily have their favorite strings and accessories mailed directly to them along with a prepaid mailer to return their old strings instead of throwing them in the trash. When String Swap receives old strings, we distribute them amongst several different organizations that we work closely with. These old strings will either be recycled at the only facility in the country that has the capability to properly do so. The strings that are in better shape are sent to companies that upcycle them into products. String Swap is always looking for more organizations that hold similar core values to donate our returned strings to. Currently we work with companies that provide opportunities for female survivors of domestic abuse, drug addiction and human trafficking. We are also working with companies that provide musical instruments to hospitals for music therapy primarily serving children with cancer and other ailments.

It blows my mind everyday to think about what String Swap has become. I am so blessed to see how much greatness we get to help support with just the simple swap of some strings. Spreading the word has been one of my favorite parts because I know we are a young company and I don’t put stress on it to grow unnecessarily fast so when I tell someone, especially a musician about the waste problem 9 out of 10 of them had no idea. Well, now they do, and they also know String Swap is going to be their new best friend for taking the guess-work out of what they can do to erase their musical footprint.