Sole Purpose

Kai Paul’s (Class of 1998) childhood was defined by the comforting sights, sounds, and smells of 1980s Jakarta: playing beneath rambutan trees, taking the becak to school, playing soccer in grassy fields, eating rendang for lunch (and dinner). In his eyes, the city was a “collection of larger villages”, and he felt deeply at home immersed in Indonesian life and culture.

“It was all so cute, honestly. Then, as I got older, there was Pondok Indah Mall and the Waterslides, the movies, and I started getting around the city a bit more — maybe being a bit nakal. Jakarta felt like a free city with so many interesting little neighborhoods everywhere to explore,” he recalls.

His parents – including his father, former JIS Middle School World Studies Teacher Dewey Paul – opened his eyes to travel from a young age, spurring him to extend his explorations to various corners of the archipelago. What he discovered was awe-inspiring diversity and “so much beauty in the lands, people, animals, food, fruits, mountains, oceans, lakes, and valleys. You can soak up so much of Indonesia and still only feel a drop.” 

This deep-rooted connection, fostered over decades, would create more than just memories; it would inspire him to get involved with Indosole, an upcycled footwear brand based in Bali. It all started with a serendipitous trip to a trade show in 2009, where a sign boasting the word “Indo” instantly drew his attention. Closer inspection revealed a curated collection of sandals with outsoles crafted from repurposed tires. Behind the display stood Kyle Parsons and Kai’s soon-to-be business partner.

“After looking into the lifecycle and durability of tires, I learned they never decompose, and there is no disposal process — big piles in countries everywhere spontaneously combusting and breeding grounds for mosquitoes,” Kai explains. 

While research opened his eyes to the environmental impacts of tires, especially in Indonesia, it was his nostalgic fascination with 1990s-era fashion that stirred his creative vision. The combination propelled him into the “fun, exciting playground” phase of Indosole’s beginnings, which was all about “experimenting, finding out what we could do, what people liked, and really how to utilize waste in ways that were aesthetically appealing, comfortable, and durable.”

This recipe for success worked so well that after the brand officially launched in 2009, a growing roster of artisan partners signed up to provide invaluable guidance on improving the ways Indosole could utilize and process tires. Together, they understood that resourcefulness alone would not be enough.

“You must build great products,” he emphasizes. 

And that’s exactly what they did. Battling against the perception that waste was an inferior resource and tires would be stiff and unyielding, Indosole came up with products that “you couldn’t even tell utilize over 60% of recycled materials”.

“This was the key to our growth: the masking of the waste in a beautiful product that is desirable based on the design and functionality.”

By 2017, demand had surged into a bottleneck, prompting an innovative shift in production. 

“We stopped cutting the tires and instead ground them down to powder, remade them into a homogenous recycled rubber, and pressed them back into soles. We call this SETT: Sole Engineered Tire Technology,” Kai elaborates. “This allowed uniformity in all of our products and a streamlined production process. This challenge of innovation and building systems was and still is exciting. Other waste has also entered our imagination — sneaker soles, and old sandals from rivers, being two more sections of the secondary resource market we currently work with.”

To date, Indosole has saved more than 80,000 tires from ending up in landfills or being burned as trash. Its functional range of footwear  — from sandals and slip-ons to high-tops — can be found at more than 40 locations across Indonesia, including six dedicated stores in Bali, as well as select stores in the United States, Korea, Japan, Australia, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Dubai, France, Portugal, and Spain.

For the entire Indosole team, the past 15 years have been a rewarding whirlwind of challenges and accomplishments: maintaining a solid team, overcoming a two-year shutdown during the pandemic, offering “responsibly made products, bringing light to waste as a resource, doing it all in Indonesia, and bringing the brand and product to a global stage”.

In 2017, Kai had the chance to return to the Cilandak campus to share his Indosole story with students as part of a series of TEDx-inspired talks. He describes it as a full-circle moment that challenged him to tap into the skills he fostered at school, to meet the high expectations and standard of excellence JIS was known for.

“I liked the challenge, and it felt great to connect that challenge with where I grew up,” he adds.

Kai hopes young entrepreneurs eyeing a career based on environmental responsibility — including future generations of Dragons — to follow their passions but also balance ambition with practicality.

“Learn cash flow, make a great product, hire a good team of passionate people who are smart and have skills,” he advises. “I truly believe that a business that does good is the future of business, as it builds community and progresses human culture. So, pursue your dreams but have goals, and respect the processes of good business.”