Published June 24, 2026
From the image of hard-working scrap collectors, VietCycle pursues a dream of turning plastic waste into resource — and a vending machine that could change how a whole community shops.
Forty years — that is how long the scrap-collecting trade (nghề ve chai) has existed in Vietnam, a span long enough for the image of the men and women collecting scrap or junk, toiling as they roam from every small alley out onto the streets, to be etched into the memory of many generations in Vietnam. It is a harsh trade, with the sun and wind, with the smell of waste often clinging to one's clothes; and yet it could be tied for more than 20 years to one great dream — VietCycle, a pioneering organization that chose to reinvent plastic waste and to journey toward turning plastic waste into a resource.
Having spent many years researching friendly collection and recycling solutions in order to create recycled plastic materials useful to people, reduce carbon emissions and protect the environment, VietCycle is always striving to improve its solutions in order to move toward a circular economy.
Reinventing plastic waste is a path full of hardship but also full of opportunity. VietCycle and its team recognized great potential in mechanical refill systems. With a solid professional foundation alongside the aspiration to realize creative initiatives to build a strong circular economy, VietCycle excellently won the Champion (Quán Quân) title. After six months of being accompanied by Vietnam's leading team of experts in business for the environment, the initiative “CyclePacking automatic vending machine” was officially completed and developed.
CyclePacking offers a solution that automates buying-and-selling transactions, building a distribution channel for laundry detergent, fabric softener, dishwashing liquid and floor cleaner while reducing the amount of plastic packaging. With this project, VietCycle hopes it will be welcomed and, step by step, will join the community in changing shopping habits, encouraging customers to use sustainable green solutions and to reuse packaging, helping to minimize plastic waste and promote the circular economy. Even more importantly, it means joining Vietnam in working toward reducing 90 million plastic packages – cutting 54 million kilograms of carbon by the year 2030.
Sharing about its earlier difficulties, VietCycle said that although the idea received good reviews, in the past the enterprise did not know how to make the most of developing or exploiting the product's potential. VietCycle also realized that its previous business, communications and sales models still had many gaps and had not been given due attention in implementation. The prize worth 10,000 USD was used by the enterprise to strengthen consulting and skills training for the VietCycle team, while boosting market surveys, communications and organizing a number of activities related to raising public awareness as well as for the product “CyclePacking automatic vending machine”.
The contest not only helped the enterprise successfully develop its model, but also accompanied the enterprise through consulting to raise the organization's capacity; together with Business Strategy Advisory Expert - Dr. Phan Tất Thứ, VietCycle was provided with and updated on new knowledge, competitive business models in practice, as well as on identifying suitable directions for the future. Through this, VietCycle could fully exploit the potential of its idea and develop the product sustainably by balancing input and output values.
The enterprise carried out focused survey activities aimed at upgrading features and improving the machine's technical specifications, such as: separating the containers optimally for cleaning, and perfecting the function of remotely managing sales data... VietCycle also stated that after these implementation activities, the enterprise set the goal that the product would reach a complete level of refinement meeting competitive market demand.
According to the current plan, the product has now been equipped with the necessary upgrades and will continue to perfect other specifications and features in the future, as well as officially launch on the market in the time ahead. Closing the contest in its role as a place that supports initiatives, GreenHub is very honored to accompany VietCycle on the road to reaping its first success with an innovative idea for the community. Through the PlastiNOvation contest in particular and the LSPP project in general, GreenHub has all the more faith in the development potential of local projects for the community and society, as well as in the potential of Vietnam's circular economy, which in the near future will grow ever more strongly.
To go from an initial business idea to a real product or business service requires going through many rounds of testing. After coming to the contest, VietCycle understood more clearly about the model, and the next goal is to further perfect the marginal value of the product. I gained a broader overview of the problem, so as to realize that: if we don't go this way then we go another way, the machine will still have values that continue to exist there, so I need to know which value to develop when there is more budget and more investment.
— Ms. Quyên, representative of the Communications Team at VietCycle
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