Ask teachers. Every so often, some lucky teacher gets a classroom big enough for a love seat or other piece of furniture—maybe yours.
Post it on a local resale site. Make a few bucks or give it away; either way, you win by sending it to a better place.
Give it away on social media. Offering the furniture to your neighborhood group has extra benefits: you enjoy the goodwill of giving someone a piece they can use, and they don’t have to travel far to pick it up.
Donate it to a community center. It’s always worth asking if your local community center or senior center needs a table/chair/couch.
Put it at the curb a few days before bulk pickup. To be crystal clear, put a sign on it that says “Free.” Some lucky passerby might decide it’s just the thing for their home and take it off your hands.
THREE Maintain (Almost) Zero-Waste Personal Care
Take a peek in your shower or bath—what do you see? If you’re like most people, you’ll find yourself staring at plastic bottles and tubes of body wash, conditioners, shampoos, and other personal-care items, plus maybe a plastic-handled razor or two, a plastic mesh shower puff, and plastic bath toys if you’ve got kids. Oh, and what about your shower curtain liner? Unless you specifically sought out a non-PVC type, it’s likely made of vinyl.
It might feel as though your health, beauty, and grooming routines only work because of the convenience of plastic and the flexibility of disposable items. When that shower puff gets mildewy or starts to smell, you can toss it and buy another. When your giant bottle of body wash runs out, you can recycle it and buy another. But given that beauty and personal care is an $89.5 billion industry (according to 2018 figures)1, you can imagine how much waste we’re collectively generating every time we run out of our favorite soaps, creams, lotions, and makeup.
There are ways to manage your personal care and reduce the amount of packaging—plastic or otherwise—used. An increasing number of manufacturers both large and small are experimenting with different packaging options, from using recycled materials to streamlining refill containers. And the beauty and personal-care industry isn’t the only one floating new, more environmentally friendly approaches. The health and fitness world is paying as much attention to our planet’s wellness as it is to ours. Here are different ways you can reduce waste in your personal-care and wellness habits.
Get a new (non-disposable) razor.
One frequently cited statistic that dates back to 1990 is the EPA estimate that two billion disposable razors and blades are produced each year2—and likely end up in the landfill. That figure doesn’t seem to have been updated in thirty years (over which time it’s surely grown), but it’s scary enough as it is. Because razor blades are sharp, and both the razors themselves and disposable blade cartridges are often made of metal and plastic, they aren’t accepted for recycling. If you’ve been using disposable razors, it’s time to invest in a less wasteful option. Try a safety razor made of metal, bamboo, or any number of sustainable materials. The stainless steel blades don’t come encased in plastic, and many people swear by how easy these razors are to use, even on sensitive skin, and what a close shave they can give.
Let your grays grow in.
If you’re looking for a zero-waste approach to hair color, embracing your natural shade is the most eco-friendly option out there. No more car trips to the salon for chemical hair dye applied with a plastic brush, out of a plastic mixing tray, from a formula that was shipped to the salon in a plastic squeeze bottle packed in a cardboard box; instead, let your original hair color grow in. (Truly, there is usually no more flattering hair color for your skin than the hue you already have.) Need inspiration? The Instagram account @grombre is dedicated to the growing-in process and features empowering and confidence-building stories of hair-color evolution.
… Or DIY your color with greener formulas. Not convinced that your natural shade is your best look? You still have options. For starters, look for hair-coloring products with naturally derived ingredients (Aveda’s hair-color line, for example, is 95 percent naturally derived3) and no ammonia (which is corrosive and toxic at high levels) or p-phenylenediamine (which is derived from petroleum). If you’re looking to dye your hair a shade in the red, brown, or black family, henna is a natural option. You can find powdered henna in bulk at some bulk-goods stores, and it also comes in bars, too. (Lush sells henna bars—in minimal packaging—in various shades.4)
Buy bars, not bottles.
A big squirt of bath gel is nice, but bar soap can be just as luxurious. Shampoo in a tube is convenient, but a bar of shampoo is even more so—it will never spill in your overnight bag! In addition to solid body and face washes, you can find solid shampoo, conditioner, shaving soap, lotions, and deodorant, all in minimal packaging like reusable tins or recycled cardboard. It all comes down to water: you can buy your personal-care products in liquid form and packaged in plastic containers, or you can buy them in dry form and just add water yourself as needed.
Read scrub labels carefully.
A few years ago there was a lot of news about microbeads, which are tiny plastic-based beads used in face and body scrubs, cleansers, and bath products. These microbeads get swept down the drain, eventually released into our waterways, and mistaken for food by marine animals, who eat them. Bad news all around. But when microbeads left the headlines, it was easy to assume that personal-care manufacturers stopped using them. Unfortunately, that’s not the case at all. Check the labels on your favorite products for ingredients that indicate microbeads are in the mix, like polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA), nylon (PA), polyurethane, and acrylates copolymer.5
Replace your plastic toothbrush habit.
When it comes to the typical worn-out plastic toothbrush, there’s really no good news at all, from a zero-waste perspective. For starters, it’s probably not recyclable: it’s too small for the recycling machinery and is likely made of composite materials that are difficult to separate.6 Given that dentists advise changing toothbrushes every three months, an estimated one billion toothbrushes are disposed of each year in the United States. (And that’s not counting the electric toothbrushes that go to the landfill, potentially leaking chemicals from their electronic insides.) However, bamboo toothbrushes are a better option—the sustainable material used for the handles is sometimes even compostable, though the nylon bristles used in most bamboo toothbrushes are not, so you’d have to rip them out before composting the handle. You can also find recycled-plastic toothbrushes, recycled-aluminum toothbrushes with replaceable heads from the Goodwell Company, or even wooden toothbrushes with pig-hair bristles that can be burned in a firepit or fireplace after they wear out.
Use toothpaste with minimal packaging.
Chances are, your curbside recycling pickup doesn’t include toothpaste tubes. Even if your community recycles toothpaste tubes through a program run by Colgate and TerraCycle, you’d still need to rinse and dry the tube inside and out before putting it in your recycling bin. It’s a worthy effort—but something requiring less effort and perhaps providing more positive impact would be to find alternate toothpaste solutions. Try some of these other options: chewable toothpaste tablets and tooth powder in recyclable packets or glass bottles, toothpaste in glass jars, or natural toothpaste in recyclable metal tubes.
Rethink your flossing routine.
It’s creepy how disposable plastic dental floss picks turn up in the weirdest places: retail parking lots, city streets, parks, beaches. Your first thought might be, Who’s flossing their teeth here? But as you think about it some more, you might realize how easily those tiny, lightweight plastics can fall out of trash bags or recycling bins—and, of course, end up on our shores like so many other plastics we discard every year. Little plastic boxes of floss are less ubiquitous in public places but just as tricky to dispose of, as they often have a metal part that makes them nearly impossible to recycle. One closer-to-zero-waste option: Dental Lace refillable dental floss, whi
ch is made of silk, not plastic or plastic-coated thread, and comes in a refillable glass container with a stainless steel top. Other reduced-waste brands come in compostable cardboard containers instead of plastic ones. Another option is to use a water pick—aka an oral pulsating irrigator—which is a handheld electronic device that shoots a thin and powerful stream of water along the gum line and between teeth. There is, however, no research so far to determine whether a water pick is as effective at removing plaque from between teeth as floss is,7 and you also have to consider how to dispose of your water pick when it eventually stops working or you grow tired of it.
Give up baby wipes—for everyone in the household.
Over the years, baby wipes have left the nursery, as people of all ages have embraced the extra-clean feeling that comes from using “flushable” wipes. But neither the packaged wet wipes meant for diapering babies nor the personal-care wipes meant for backsides of all ages are environmentally friendly. Researchers at Ryerson University in Ontario, Canada, tested 101 single-use wipes—23 of which were promoted as “flushable”8—and found that none of them was able to fall apart or disperse safely through the sewer system. And if these wipes—many of which contain plastic fibers—aren’t degrading in water, there’s no reason to expect them to degrade in any reasonably speedy way in a landfill. For babies, try keeping a stack of soft organic cotton or bamboo cloths or washcloths (or even repurposed bedsheets or old cotton T-shirts) on hand that you can wet or dampen to use, and then machine wash in the same load with the cloth diapers. You could also do the same for the adults in the house, keeping a small lidded trash can in the bathroom for used cloths.
Choose OTC pills in bottles, not blister packs.
While it’s always most important to choose the medication that’s most effective for you and whatever condition you’re trying to treat, your second consideration should be the packaging it comes in. There’s generally little or no choice when it comes to prescriptions, which by law must be packaged and labeled according to accepted federal standards.9 But there are ways to reduce your prescription packaging waste. When filling a prescription, it’s always worth asking your pharmacy to skip the bag and just hand you the bottle and the informational printout, if necessary. And when it comes to over-the-counter drugs, a glass or plastic bottle of tablets is easier to reuse or recycle when empty than a box filled with individually foil-packed pills.
Soap up with a washcloth.
Nylon mesh loofahs may give good suds, but they trap bacteria and mildew, prompting experts to recommend they be replaced every few months… which means if you use them properly, you’re sending four or more straight to the landfill every year, where they’ll live forever. A better option? Washcloths in the sustainable, low-impact fabric of your choice (organic cotton, bamboo, and lyocell are all good options). Cloths should be changed a few times a week (and your bath towel once a week),10 so be sure to stock up so that you can wash a full load of cloths and towels come the weekend.
Make your own sheet masks.
Who says (almost) zero-wasters can’t embrace trends? Instead of buying single-use sheet masks for your face, try creating your own custom sheet mask out of an old pillowcase, T-shirt, or handkerchief. Cut a square of cloth slightly larger than your face, then drape it over your face and, with a non-waterproof makeup pencil, trace around your face, just inside your hairline. Then trace around your mouth and eyes and mark where your nostrils are. Remove the cloth, cut out holes where marked, and place the mask back over your face and adjust as needed to get the right fit. Now that you have a template, you can make a few masks to keep on hand. When you’re ready for a mask, simply saturate it with the treatment of your choice, whether store-bought or DIY.
DIY Sheet Mask Treatments
For each formula, use roughly equal amounts of each ingredient—just enough to create a mixture that will saturate your mask.
MOISTURE MASK: oat milk
EXFOLIATING MASK: pineapple juice, lemon juice, and white grape juice
SOOTHING MASK: strong chamomile tea
ANTIOXIDANT MASK: honey, yogurt, and turmeric powder
GLOW MASK: honey and orange juice
POST-SUN MASK: natural aloe
Choose beauty brands that make an effort.
Traditional plastic compacts and lipstick tubes often have metal components, making them ineligible for most recycling programs, but there are more efficient ways to strive toward zero waste when it comes to your makeup and skin-care routine. Many beauty brands are using recyclable and compostable packaging; experimenting with recycled materials, including plastics, cardboard, and aluminum, as well as sustainable bamboo, glass, and plastic resin derived from corn;11 and offering reusable containers and refills for their products. Just a few of the brands making strides in this area are Aether Beauty, Antonym Cosmetics, Au Naturale Cosmetics, Axiology, Bésame Cosmetics, Elate Cosmetics, Faraday Face, Ilia Beauty, Kjaer Weis, Lush, RMS Beauty, Sappho New Paradigm, Tata Harper, and Vapour Beauty.
Use scents that make sense.
It’s estimated that perfumes, body sprays, and other personal scents typically contain a dozen or more potentially hazardous synthetic chemicals, including petrochemicals, which are derived from petroleum and create greenhouse gases.12 It’s hard to do the research on your favorite scent, though, because fragrance companies aren’t legally required to disclose the ingredients in their products. The good news is that there are an increasing number of companies devoted to creating natural scents from sustainable ingredients, in recyclable and refillable packaging, with fully transparent ingredient lists. Whether you choose fragrances made from essential oils or ones that come in solid form in recyclable tins, your signature scent should make you feel as great as you smell.
Reduce period-related waste.
If you’re currently using traditional menstrual pads and tampons, you may be interested to know that there are actually many ways you can work toward having a zero-waste period. From an eco-friendly perspective, conventional tampons aren’t great. They’re made with bleached, non-organic cotton (a material that requires a huge amount of natural resources and pesticides to produce), and some contain dyes as well.13 And if your usual brand is packaged in plastic applicators wrapped in plastic wrappers and tucked inside a cardboard box… you can see how the waste adds up. For a baby step, try transitioning to a cardboard applicator—or, better yet, a brand with no applicator. Take it a step further by switching to an organic brand, like o.b. organic, LOLA, Rael, or Veeda (to name just a few). Many of these offer mail-order subscriptions, while others can be purchased at your local drugstore. Most offer pads, too. If you really want to step away from disposable period products, though, period panties and reusable cotton pads are two other ways to go. The idea is the same: the fabric absorbs the blood while you’re wearing it, and then you remove, rinse, wash, and wear again. Fans of period panties swear they don’t encounter leaks or icky feelings, but if you’re skeptical, you can always try a more time-trusted method: the menstrual cup. You insert this flexible silicone or latex rubber cup much like a tampon, and it suctions to the vaginal walls, collecting blood before it leaves your body. You can leave it in for up to twelve hours, and then remove, empty, wash with soap and water, and reinsert.
Seek out sustainable workout clothes.
More and more athletic-apparel brands are using post-consumer recycled materials, organic cotton, low-impact dyes, and eco-friendly packaging, making it less wasteful to replace your favorite running tights or bike shorts when they finally fall apart. Patagonia, Satva, Alternative Apparel, and Boody are just some of the brands manufacturing workout and athleisure clothing with an eye toward impact. Other companies are rolling out pieces within their existing lines using sustainable practices. Athleta’s SuperSonic tights, for example, are made of recycled nylon and spandex. Check the labels before you buy, and if your favorite brand hasn’t implemented any sustainable or lower-waste measures, let them know that it matters to you.
Create a home gym with household items.
A good sweat shouldn’t have to cost money or involve special equipment. While one could argue that joining a fitness club is zero-waste because you’re buying a service, not a product, the fact is that club needs to fuel its heat, AC, and electricity; wash used towels; and frequently replace worn or outdated equipment (or run the risk of losing members, which would make all other operational efforts even more wasteful on a resources-per-person basis). Instead, utilize objects in your home environment to get a challenging workout. The following are just a few ideas; take a good look around your own home to come up with even more smart multitasking moves.
Become a stair master. Lace up those running shoes and take the stairs—up and down—until you feel the burn. Need a bigger challenge? Try taking them two at a time, at the same speed.
Use a kitchen chair as leverage. Tricep dips, lunges, planks—these muscle toners and more can all be done using a hard (not upholstered) chair or bench.
Slide on towels. Sliders can maximize the intensity of core moves like mountain climbers and plank jacks—and on a smooth, solid surface, towels work just as well as purpose-built equipment.
Use full beverage holders as weights. Fill two equally sized, clean, and dry beverage containers with dried beans or rice, screw the lids on tight, and then lift. (Too heavy? Remove some beans, then work up to a full bottle in each hand.)
The (Almost) Zero-Waste Guide Page 5