Our Commitment to the Planet
1. We use pouches
Pouches use 70% less energy to produce than rigid packaging. They also weigh much less.
We spent months finding a pouch that is produced using as little energy as possible. They aren't the most beautiful things in the world, but you have to love them for what's on the inside.
We are currently working with several innovators in plastic-free packaging to find a pouch that is produced with as little energy as possible and is entirely biodegradable (don't be fooled by biodegradable plastic - it can only be broken down in very specific temperatures, and often biodegrades into micro-plastic), but until this innovation exists in the commercial world, we have found the best possible solution in the most environmentally-friendly way.
2. The problem with recycling
Around 40% of household products are recycled currently in the UK. It's a process that has been promoted by the government and manufacturers. However, it has become clear that recycling is not an entirely logical system when it comes to different material groups. For example, recycling aluminium cans works, as they become other aluminium cans, but the recycling of cosmetic bottles is more complicated, and the logic is more unclear.
Unfortunately, the residue left from personal care products means that they cannot be recycled to become other bottles. Only bottles containing drinks can be recycled into other bottles. So your shampoo bottle gets turned into something like a road traffic cone. In other words, it’s not recycled, it’s ‘down-cycled’. And when this new product comes to the end of its life? It can be downcycled no further and ends up in landfill.
The sad fact is: almost every plastic cosmetic bottle ultimately goes to landfill – and that’s not something you would imagine happens from looking at that neat little recycling logo.
So when a bottle is made from recycled material, the material used is usually either ‘pre-consumer’ waste (in other words un-used bottles) or former drinks bottles. Milk bottles are often used as they provide a consistent source of material with little contamination. This means that a recycling logo on a home cleaning product bottle does not stop the manufacture of another home cleaning bottle the next time you buy the product. It’s an illogical system and we can do so much better.
3. We ensure our pouches are properly reproduced into new things!
Pouches are rarely recyclable in normal recycling. This is because of the mixed material used to ensure ease of use. However, we've discovered that if you collect them in large quantities, it becomes highly efficient to reprocess them to become other products. Send them back to us and we will pass them on to one of our reprocessing partners where they are broken down into hydrocarbon feedstock. This highly efficient process has a very low carbon footprint (much less than traditional recycling) and the outcome is a variety of highly versatile products that can be used to fuel homes, run cars or can be reprocessed back into plastic products. Unlike traditional recycling, where mixed waste plastics that are considered too contaminated or mixed for traditional recycling methods are currently disposed of via landfill or incineration, this process enables the plastic to be continually recycled, whilst retaining the value of the material.
Thus creating an entirely circular economy - with zero waste.