Silly Little Plastic Cat: Back Market Supports Independent Documentary on Plastic, Repair and the Garfield Phone Mystery

Back Market, the global marketplace for refurbished technology, today announces the release of Silly Little Plastic Cat - a short independent documentary directed by Brooklyn-based filmmaker Zack Grant.

The film tells the story behind one of the most visually distinctive and persistently mysterious environmental stories in recent memory: the decades-long appearance of Garfield landline phones on the beaches of Brittany, France.

Since 2019, the story has circulated in global media - an absurd, recurring puzzle that somehow never got old. The film finally provides the answer: a shipping container, lost at sea in the 1980s, still yielding its contents to the Atlantic coast. And it goes further, turning the camera on the Brittany community who have been living with this mystery for thirty years.

"Great stories change how people think, and this one certainly changed how I think. Yes, the Garfield phone story is funny and entertaining, but it's also a metaphor for a consumer culture gone awry. I hope this film leaves audiences thinking about what we make, what we lose, and what we leave behind for other people to pick up the pieces."

— Zack Grant, Director

Running at ten minutes, Silly Little Plastic Cat gives voice to the people the phones found: the collectors, the beachcombers, the local activists who turned a curiosity into a conversation about repair and reuse. The film does not make an argument so much as it allows one to emerge - from the landscape, the objects, and the people who chose to pay attention.

Back Market exists on the premise that the things we make should last longer than we allow them to. The company's marketplace for refurbished technology is built on the belief that repair is not a compromise - it is the smart, logical alternative to a system designed around replacement. The Garfield phone story, and the repair culture it sparked in Brittany, is the same argument told through thirty years of ocean tides.

"Fast tech wants you to forget about the things you own the moment something newer arrives. This film is about what happens when you don't forget, and when a community decides to pay attention. That's exactly the world Back Market is trying to build, one where repair and refurbishment is the obvious choice. Supporting a filmmaker who found the human truth in that argument felt less like a marketing decision and more like the right thing to do."

— Joy Howard, CMO, Back Market

Silly Little Plastic Cat is available to watch in full on Back Market's YouTube channel from 19 June 2026.

About the Film

Title: Silly Little Plastic Cat

Director: Zack Grant

Runtime: 10 minutes

Supported by: Back Market

Distribution: YouTube (Back Market channel)

Release date: 19 June 2026

About Zack Grant

Zack Grant is a multi-disciplinary director, photographer and producer based in Brooklyn, New York. Named to SHOOT Magazine's New Directors Showcase, his work spans documentary film, commercial direction and music video. His films have screened at PBS, HollyShorts Film Festival, Sidewalk Film Festival and ReelAbilities New York. He is the founder of creative production studio 2020land. His background in commercial direction - spanning agencies including Droga5, Barton F. Graf and Spotify - informs a documentary practice rooted in visual precision and quiet emotional intelligence.

About Back Market

Back Market is a leading marketplace dedicated to professionally refurbished technology. Back Market's mission is to create a world that does more with what we already have by prolonging the lifespan of electronic devices through circularity and repair. Founded in Paris in 2014, the company has grown by double digits year over year and to date has 18 million customers across 17 markets, avoiding more than 2 billion Kg of carbon emissions.