A Recyclable Sock Hanger?

I feel as though I am channeling my inner Andy Roony: ’Dj’ever notice that you can't buy socks without buying plastic?

They might come in a bundle inside a plastic bag, which you may be able to recycle if you know where, but if they're the kinds that hang on hooks in pairs or packages, there's almost always a hard plastic hook in there.

This weekend, I finally broke down and bought a pair of Smart Wool socks for all of my upcoming outdoor protest activities, and realized as I took them out of the package that it was entirely made of paperboard:


At first I thought the hook part was plastic...


...but as I unfolded the cleverly designed insert tab on the back (left)...


...and saw the hanger in full, I realized it was also paperboard.


So overall, they've got two pieces of paper board with ink and some kind of coating. The yellow part (with the unprinted side shown in the last photo) is marked as recyclable. I'm not as sure about the black part, though; it's not marked, plus the finish feels like it might be a plastic laminate.

Nice paper engineering though, and I'll be looking into whether that part recycles or not. Seems silly to go to all that work and end up with an unrecyclable piece.