De-Plasticize Your Life!
By Ruth Ann Smalley
A lot has changed since that day in 2015 when I took my students on the shortest field trip ever. Students in my Women Writers and Environmental Justice course walked down the hall with me, to the science wing of the building. There, they took in a large hallway poster displaying the findings of a group of their fellow students: a study of the presence of plastic microbeads in local bodies of water. The 20 or so young college women were aghast, because these microbeads were a common ingredient in the facial scrubs many of them were using. While my students had been unaware of the issue, fortunately, activists and scientists were hard at work. That same year, the Microbead-Free Waters Act was passed.
I’d venture to say that the general public is much more aware of the plastic problem now, at least in general terms. You’d have to be pretty actively avoiding information not to notice the constant headlines about where plastics are showing up—both outside and inside of us. The bad news keeps multiplying.
But there is good news, as well. Recent local and global polls show widespread concern and support for bans of single use plastics. Here in New York State, the Senate passed the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Act on June 7, and it is now up to the State Assembly to pass, too. We desperately need reform on this level, because we are awash in plastic and there is only so much our individual efforts can accomplish.
That said, our efforts are important, and we can pitch in both to help bills like this pass, and to reduce our own reliance on single use plastic. If you are a New York state resident, Judith Enck of Beyond Plastic offers this quick guide to making your voice heard for the next steps of the bill.
Plastic Free July is also a good way to up your personal plastic-avoidance game. Maybe you’ve made positive changes over the years, but have slipped a bit as life keeps handing out challenges on other fronts. Or, maybe you haven’t kept up with the many great alternatives to be found out there now. Whatever your situation, spending a month committing or re-committing to greater plastic avoidance can help reset your resolve. And, hopefully, set you on a path to some new or refreshed habits when the month is over.
Rebecca Prince-Ruiz started Plastic Free July in Western Australia back in 2010, as an outgrowth of her Plastic Free Foundation. Since then, it has grown into a “global social movement.” According to their 2023 impact report, last year about 89 million people in 190 countries took part. Check out their website for resources and more information about how to participate in the challenge.
A recent article in Taste Magazine notes the rise of “refilleries” where container conscious folks can bring their own and buy in bulk. Honest Weight has been offering this service pretty much forever. Concern about over-packaging shows up in the earliest Coop Scoop discussions of what to stock. Buying preferences back then even tilted away from offering packaged mixes of anything that could be found and assembled from the bulk aisle. While Honest Weight has responded to shoppers’ request for more convenience foods over the years, our bulk options are still amazing, and there are many products throughout our aisles to help us contain our necessities without plastic.
Below is a list of some of my favorites.
Whether it's your sandwich, your sheet pan, or your leftovers, we’ve got you covered:
If You Care makes parchment paper, low impact aluminum foil, and sandwich bags.
Lunchskins offers paper snack bags in fun patterns.
Silicone Stashers come in all shapes and sizes, and we’ve got Bee's Wrap and even vegan wrappings and bowl covers.
Along with a variety of storage containers, we’ve also got the ever-useful canning jar! I love using these for small-footprint leftovers like a half avocado, onion, or tomato, soup, extra coconut milk or tomato sauce, etc.
For produce, you can use mesh bags—just visit the service desk before you shop, to mark the tare weight on their labels—and you’ll find paper tea bags for your loose tea from bulk. For hydrating and eating on the move, water bottle choices abound, and reusable straws and cutlery are also available.
The Bulk section keeps a number of free bottles and jars on hand, to help you carry home your oils, vinegars, soy sauce, maple syrup and more. You can donate to this supply, too, if you wish. Just put them at the sink in the bulk office.
When it comes to cleaning and body care, there are loads of choices, too. Wellness Bulk carries both laundry and dish soap, and a great array of high quality shampoos, conditioners, lotions, liquid soaps, and hand sanitizer that you can bring in your own containers to fill. There’s even bulk sunscreen! You can also avoid plastic tubes by purchasing toothpaste tabs in glass bottles.
You will find handy glass and metal spray bottles, as well as refillable liquid soap dispensers nearby. You can even cut your own locally-made bar soap, or choose from a variety of low-to-no packaging soap or shampoo bars.
Wool dryer balls sprinkled with a little essential oil make a fantastic alternative to dryer sheets, and the houseware section offers plastic-free cleaning options in the form of loofah scrubbers, walnut scouring pads, and cellulose sponges.
Probably the hardest part is just making the plan. As a friend noted, “It’s a mindset thing.” You have to decide to switch behaviors, identify the alternative you’re going to activate, and then remember to do it. It may also mean planning for a little more time for your shopping trip—getting tare weights, writing down PLU numbers, and dispensing your own stuff does take a few more minutes!
And give yourself some grace when you forget repeatedly to bring your containers. It’s a learning and re-learning process, and it takes time to get in the habit. Sometimes life is too hectic and distractions intervene. In my own case, I had for months had a plan to buy a snap-top silicone GoToob for my favorite bulk lotion. I kept forgetting or being in too much of a hurry to do more than grab a plastic container. It was downright silly how much attention I had to give it to actually carry it out: decide on it ahead of getting in my car, buy the GoToob separately and get the tare weight, and then fill it and do the rest of my shop. But it’ll always be easier in the future!
The whole modern commercial enterprise counts on us defaulting to convenience—as another friend put it when we were discussing this: “Everything is set up to make it easier to create environmental pollution.” The good news is that Honest Weight has set up some levers for extricating yourself from this. Even small actions help, and you can decide what fits best for your current circumstances. While we were chatting about it, my friend realized she could easily just leave her lidded glass sandwich container in the car, for ease in taking home leftovers when dining out.
Plastic Free July can help you identify other small actions, enhance your resolve, and build up your momentum. And check out Beyond Plastics to become more involved in plastic policy reforms: lending your individual voice along with your personal actions will help create the large-scale boost this problem requires.