Buttons made of vegetable ivory were once in great demand in industrial parts of the world. Vegetable ivory is the hard white seed endosperm from palms of the genus <i>Phytelephas</i> (Arecaceae). After World War II, ivory nuts were largely replaced by plastics. Recently the authors visited a factory on the coast of Ecuador that was founded in 1926 and still produces buttons of vegetable ivory on a large scale. Some 80 employees produce about 5,000 pounds of buttons a month; these are exported to Japan, Germany, and Italy. The production is described step by step and the future of vegetable ivory is discussed briefly.