A Toronto-based company says its new clothes hanger is an environmentally friendly alternative to metal and plastic because it can be fully recycled.

The "smart hanger," made of paper-board fibres, can be placed in blue bins in Toronto and is made from 100 per cent recycled material. The hanger was developed by a company called media hook, which is marketing it to drycleaners in Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia.

Media hook has signed a contract with the Ontario Fabricare Association, formerly known as the Dry Cleaners and Launderers Institute of Ontario, to distribute "smart hangers" through its members, Leigh Meadows, the company president, said Wednesday in Toronto .

She said her goal is to have 12 million of the hangers distributed to drycleaners in Ontario in the first year of the product's launch.

The smart hanger is a solid triangle of paper board, with a hook that contains space in the middle for a message. The current version is designed to hang shirts, but media hook is working on designs to hold women's clothing and winter coats. The company already has a design for pants.

"It's a completely biodegradable clothes hanger," Meadows said. "It contains no harmful inks or glues."

She said the hanger is a sustainable alternative to metal and plastic hangers, which end up in landfills.

"It takes 100 years for a metal hanger to break down. We can't afford to keep doing this to our planet. It's a change, but it's a simple one and it will make a difference."

Companies can use the message space on the hanger to celebrate their environmental initiatives, Meadows said, describing the space as an "ideal vehicle for socially responsible advertising."

Meadows said she lobbied the City of Toronto for seven months to have the product accepted in the blue bin program. The city agreed this month.

The hanger is manufactured by PearceWellwood Inc., which makes corrugated and paper products in Brampton, Ont. The hanger came into being after Meadows' young son, Jacob, suggested to her a year ago that clothes hangers should be made out of paper so they could be recycled.

That day, Meadows said, she had planned to return some metal hangers to the drycleaners but accidentally snagged her leg on one of them and decided to throw them all away. "My son was aghast that I was going to throw them out. He said, 'Mommy, you can't do that!'"

After the two talked a bit about the environment, her son, who was then six years old, said: "Why don't they just make them out of paper?" Meadows said the Toronto District School Board has placed such an emphasis on recycling in schools that even children in junior kindergarten know what should be done.

Meadows soon began looking into her son's suggestion, and a year later, her hanger business has become a full-time job. She said she plans to talk to representatives of retail outlets and hotels in Canada next to expand the market.