Sustainable Find: Reducing Single-Use Plastic in Your Household

More and more options are becoming available to aid in our transition away from single-use plastics in day-to-day life. 

Who would have thought a mere few year's ago that so many of us would carry a "keep cup" when purchasing a coffee or smoothie, or carry aluminium straws lest a plastic one is offered when out and about?

The concept of becoming more sustainable in our daily lives can get overwhelming though and, for many of us, popping down to our local Woolies to purchase cleaning and laundry products can appear to be an easier and more affordable option. 

What if it isn't though?

What if I told you that I had found a way to relieve your eco-guilt and to ensure your wallet doesn't cry in pain?

For several years now, I've been very intentional in my cleaning and laundry products purchases. I've skewed towards companies whose "green" claims were impressive, but few have either delivered as effective a result, smelled as good or really closed the loop on their manufacturing processes as a company I've recently discovered, ZeroCo. 

ZeroCo epitomises so many of my Pink Hibiscus brand goals as well, so being a new customer has been such an educational experience for me with my big picture planning! 

Let's break down the highlights:

CLOSED LOOP

A reply-paid satchel is included with every purchase for you to pop your empty refill pouches in and return to ZeroCo for cleaning, refilling and reusing. 

They're also aware of their carbon footprint and ask you to collect 15 empty refill pouches before returning. 

Refill pouches (and the subsequent return of them for recycling) is the direction we'll also be taking in the future once Pink Hibiscus makes the transition to being manufactured rather than handmade in Australia. It's something I'm truly excited about and, given the many messages I receive from you all about wanting to refill your packaging, I have a sneaky suspicion you're just as excited as I am!

PUTTING OCEAN AND LANDFILL PLASTIC TO GOOD USE

Many of you may have followed my extensive search for ocean and landfill plastic solutions for our Pink Hibiscus packaging. Whilst I'm still a small batch operator though, I just can't find a manufacturer willing to assist in this area...and it's supremely frustrating!

So, the concept of having reusable dispensers made from ocean plastic and refill pouches utilising plastic waste diverted from landfill, is one that is more than appealing to me!

ZeroCo have removed over 6,000kg of plastic rubbish from the ocean to date and that number keeps on growing! You can even track which part of the planet the plastic from your dispenser has been rescued from by entering in the tracking code on the back of your dispenser! 

My Dishwashing Liquid dispenser was collected from the Java Sea in Jakarta Indonesia in December 2019 and there's even a video of the ocean clean up in action...how fabulous is that?!

The company projects that they will eradicate 982,250 single-use plastic bottles from Aussie homes in the next 12 months!

INGREDIENTS

As so many of you are, I'm very wary of what ingredients I place on my skin and what I use to clean the house and wash our laundry with. 

Thankfully ZeroCo ticks many of my boxes in relation to what they do and don't formulate their products with. 

All of their products are made in Australia (extra big tick from me!), are plant-based, vegan and cruelty-free, grey water safe, paraben-free and palm oil free.

They do contain sulfates though. Sodium coco-sulfate to be exact, which is a coconut-derived surfactant and viscosity builder. 

Several of their products are also fragranced with essential oils and all of the ones I've purchased smell divine!

COMPETITIVE PRICING & EFFICACY

ZeroCo has used independent testing laboratory D-Labs to measure the efficacy of their cleaning products against Australia's #1 performing products and Australia's #1 selling "eco" products and the results are remarkable - you can check them out on their website. 

They've also dedicated themselves to keeping their pricing transparent and competitive against the leading supermarket brands, which was definitely a consideration for me before committing to make my first purchase. 

The two products that I haven't transitioned to yet are the Laundry Liquid and Dishwasher Tablets, as they're a tad pricier than the Earth's Choice ones I currently use. Everything else was very competitively priced against our usual brands though. 

_____________

I never thought I'd say that I'm looking forward to cleaning, but with these products I think I might be! 

Cudos to ZeroCo for truly walking the walk and making a difference when it comes to easily, affordably and stylishly helping us transition to utilising reusable and recyclable products in the home.

Bonus points for helping Mother Nature in such an effective, measurable and major way and for taking us on the journey with you. 

What items have you swapped out in your home to reduce your single-use plastic use? Let me know in the comments below... 

Image credit: ZeroCo