The Plastic-Free Movement Is Working

Hi everyone,

We are halfway through Plastic Free July (PFJ)! One nagging question you may have (I know I do) is whether it’s worth the extra effort. My piddly little reusable cup against a whole ocean of the stuff, and not many others seem to even care?

So I have been in need of a little motivation… and found it! Here are some key stats from the Plastic Free Foundation’s 2025 report:

• Last year, there were 174 million PFJ participants across 190 countries. This equates to roughly 16% of the world’s consumers.

• 290,000 tonnes of plastic was avoided in a single month (July)

• Around 15 million tonnes of waste kept out of the world over the last seven years

• 13kg less household waste was achieved per person

And most importantly, 86% of participants said the changes they made became lasting habits. Plus people doing the challenge took 15% more plastic-reducing actions than the people who sat it out.

There is peer-reviewed research too. An experimental study ran a group through the challenge against a control group and found their single-use plastic dropped.

I find this pretty motivating. PFJ started with one woman in Western Australia back in 2011 and it is now the biggest plastic-avoidance movement on the planet. So if you have ever felt like your little swaps are worthless (or worth little), they are not at all. They are adding up to something that can be definitively measured in millions of tonnes.

We have written an article on this topic before and I updated it today with all this and more: Is the zero waste movement having an impact?

If you want your next swap to be plastic-free, the easiest place to start is what things are made of. Here are a few of the materials we have written about that help you avoid plastic.

Around the kitchen and home:

• Stainless steel for bottles, containers, and cookware

• Silicone where a reusable beats single-use plastic, with safety caveats

• Plastic-free water bottles

For the wardrobe and home products, natural fibers do not shed plastic microfibers and they break down at the end of their life:

• Natural and organic latex for mattresses, pillows, and stretchy basics

• Linen

• Hemp

• Organic cotton

• Lyocell (TENCEL)

• Cork

Our roundup of sustainable fabrics goes through more and ranks them by impact. If you are still building your July habits, our plastic-free toolkit is still free to download (and I’ve fixed the front page issue).

Update to our category pages:

For those who have been a bit frustrated when navigating our new site (not so new anymore now), I am pleased to say there are new category pages which make the whole site much easier to navigate. Check them out and let me know if more improvements are in order (I’m still making sure everything is tagged properly):

Home & Living, Fashion, Beauty & Care, Zero & Low Waste, DIY, and more.

Thank you as always,

Joy x