Five easy swaps to start your journey towards eco-sustainability in the beauty and hygiene space
All of us Lotus Brand Eco-Warriors know from our last blog that going plastic free and eco friendly in the bathroom space can be daunting. To buy everything at once would be 100's of dollars, and a ton of time researching. Even just finding eco-friendly swaps for your bathroom that are TRULY, to their core, plastic free and sustainably sourced is really difficult. Tossing everything at once to replace it is not recommended since it's wasteful and all that plastic is going straight to a landfill and defeats your purpose anyways. So what is the answer? We've got your back!
We came up with a list of the 5 easiest swaps to make the first steps on your journey a little less of a headache, and more of an exciting. It's time to try something new that is not only good for YOU- but good for the Earth too. Let's get started:
1. Bamboo Toothbrush
It's thought that nearly 3 billion plastic toothbrushes are thrown away every year worldwide. Most end up floating in the ocean somewhere and can take up to 1000 years to decompose. To give you an idea of how drastic throwing a toothbrush away can be- the average person uses over 300 in their lifetime. So, one person's toothbrushes can take up to 300,000 combined years to decompose. A Bamboo toothbrush lasts around 3 months, then only takes another three months to biodegrade. They are lightweight, and bamboo has an antifungal and antibacterial components which make it the perfect first swap for your bathroom. Switching to a bamboo toothbrush will be the most harmless and least habit changing swap you could make.
Lotus Brand believes in this swap to much, that we are offering all our members a free bamboo toothbrush just for subscribing to our email list; all you pay is $3.50 for shipping.
( Psst...That's less then the Value of the $5 Bamboo toothbrush!)
We supply our members with toothbrushes through Change Toothpaste. The Change family is wonderful, kind, and were the first company to support Lotus Brand. We are Proud to carry their products in our Lotus Brand Boxes.
2. Toothpaste Tablets
With toothbrushes, must come toothpaste. This swap is relatively easy to make with a bamboo toothbrush since the two pretty much go hand-in-hand. Each year, more than 900 million toothpaste tubes around the world go to landfills and oceans. Standard tubes cannot be recycled and are made up of 11 layers of plastics, polymers and resins, which take over 500 years to break down. This means that every toothpaste tube ever created is still in the landfill somewhere. Toothpaste tablets are just like paste, without the waste. The tablets taste great and are vegan, soy, nut, and gluten free. Probably the greatest thing about them is you can take the tablets LITERALLY anywhere.
Lotus' August Box, and every box will include a month supply of toothpaste tablets to hold you over until the next month's AMAZING box comes out so you'll never have to buy a toothpaste tube again!
3. Shampoo and Conditioner Bars
As your writer, I admit, it took some time to find my perfect shampoo and conditioner bar scent but I will NEVER go back to a plastic bottle-filled bathtub. NEVER-EVER! I like my bathtub ledges free of clutter and the way I accomplished that was with bamboo racks for my Wonderful shampoo and conditioner bars. The environmental impact alone is incredible. 550 million shampoo bottles are disposed in the US alone, and while we know one person using shampoo bars isn't going to keep 550 million plastic bottles out of oceans and landfills, we believe that sustainability isn't Everyone doing every single plastic free thing right, it's one person, making the choice to choose to refuse plastic and growing the movement, one by one. Keep in mind not all bar soaps are sustainable, some are still wrapped in plastic, or use palm oil which is not a sustainable resource. Currently we are in love with Wildly American and feature them and their rising star shampoo bar in our first August box.
Lotus Brand alternates from shampoo to conditioner every other month so you always have one coming or going, and they are zero waste, when it's gone it's down the drain. Nothing to throw away or recycle.
4. Glass Jars Over Plastic Bottles
Lotus knows that some product is just more easily dispensed out of a pump then it is a bar, for example: lotion could be a difficult swap if you were trading out a super aromatic tube of lotion for a lotion bar, you might feel oily and not like it and ultimately end up back at using plastics again. For this reason, we wanted to feature what we have in our August box for a body wash/scrub and offer an alternative to using or going back to said plastics above.
In our August box we have included a premium item from Among the Flowers called Pink Salt. It's a whipped salt, with coconut oil and castile soap scrub infused with essential oils and botanical extracts for absorption. It hydrates your skin, while sloughing away any excess on top. It smells so good you're going to wish you had a trough of it!
You can find everything you love that usually would come in plastic in a glass jar and 9 times out of 10 it's made with better more sustainable ingredients. Another option is to find a set of glass pump jars you like and go to a refill station at Farmers Markets or maybe you have a refill-zero waste store near you! That way you still get the liquid soap you love without all the plastic waste.
5. Bath Bombs
Last but not least, we had to get in on this bath bomb craze. Eco-Friendly doesn't always have to be for tools and all the stuff we NEED in the bathroom to be hygienic and clean. Sometimes we can do Eco-Friendly for fun and the way to do that is a little bit of self-care girlfriend! That's right, just make sure it's not wrapped in plastic, grab your favorite book and hop in that tub and be an Eco-QUEEN! Truly; a perfectly aromatic bath bomb can change the World, for you at least. Every. Single. Lotus box will have an artisanal bath bomb so make sure you subscribe to not miss out on all that well-deserved, eco-friendly self care!
Hope this helps make the transition from clutter to Eco-courageous a little easier and a lot more fun, make sure to follow us on our socials for more tips, tricks, and freebies!
