Every year, the beauty industry creates an estimated 120 billion items of packaging, most of which goes to waste at the end of its life. The industry is slowly changing, but we all need to do more in order to be greener. Here at ARK Skincare we have been working hard to take simple yet effective steps to cut waste and shrink our carbon footprint.

With this in mind, in this post, we thought we'd share our tips on how you can also reduce the use of plastic in your own day to day life and make more sustainable choices. 

ARK Skincare's 5 Top Tips For Living Sustainably

1. Say no to plastic straws

Many cafes and restaurants are doing their bit by switching over from plastic to paper straws which is a great step forward. However, these aren’t always available. If you often purchase drinks when you’re out and about, it may be time to invest in your own reusable straw. You can find them for affordable prices in all kinds of different shops and online businesses.

Take a look at a set of reusable stainless steel straws from The Lion Sparkles here!

2. Bring your own bag!

From the 5th of October, 2015, the UK introduced a 5p charge for plastic carrier bags in an attempt to decrease the amount they were used in an act to become greener. The amount of plastic bags issued by big supermarket retailers decreased by 86% since the charge was introduced. In the hope to decrease the number further, the fee will be doubled to 10p as of 2021.

To avoid having to buy a plastic bag each time you shop, it’s a good idea to invest in a few of your own reusable bags and make a habit of keeping them in useful places like your bag or car. There’s nothing worse than having to juggle your shopping!

3. Ditch plastic water bottles 

Not only are plastic bottles bad for the environment, but they can also be expensive! Instead of buying plastic bottles, choose a bottle from a high-quality material to refill yourself when you need to. You can choose between stainless steel, glass and lots of great designs. 

The Refill organization, founded in 2015, created an app for those in need of freshwater to find the nearest place to refill their bottle, therefore reducing plastic consumption.

By typing your location into the app, you can find the nearest cafe, shop, or supermarket that will provide a free refill service in-store. To find out more about the Refill organization you can head over to their website by clicking here. 

4. Think about your storage materials

Instead of storing food items in plastic jars and boxes, opt for glass instead. Mason jars for example make great storage pots for kitchen ingredients. If you make packed lunches for school or work, you can choose alternatives to plastic bags/lunch boxes by choosing a stainless steel lunch box or beeswax food wrap. 

Wild and Stone offer a sample sheet of beeswax wrap which you can find here.  Simply warm the material in your hands before wrapping up your food of choice. You can then wash it with a little washing-up liquid and water before using it again!

5. Support sustainable businesses 

Here at ARK Skincare, we are in the process of making some effective changes to become greener and ensure we’re encouraging more sustainable choices for our customers. Here are some of the greener steps we've taken so far: 

Reducing Plastic

We’ve recently moved our popular moisturiser formulas over to a new jar made from a single material and half the amount of plastic making it much easier to recycle. While it may look slightly smaller, it actually contains 55ml, so you will receive an additional 5ml for free!

Recycling

Recycling is now a crucial decision for every new product development. We assess all-new packaging in terms of ease of recycling and are continuing to review whether options from recycled materials are available. Many of our packs are already easy to recycle in normal council collections. 

Terracycle

We are thrilled to offer a recycling solution for our packaging for containers which can't be recycled in council collections. Simply bring back your empty beauty containers to our boutique where we have a zero waste box they can go into and we'll take care of the rest...

The empty packaging will then be sent to Terracycle for recycling. So instead of being landfilled or incinerated, the plastics will be sorted and turned into raw materials that can be reused.

No more cellophane!

A huge positive change we’ve made this year is ditching cello-wrap. From now on, all new stock cartons will be secured top and bottom with a security seal, without all of the additional plastic. Please note this will be an ongoing process while we sell-through our pre-wrapped boxes. 

To find more ideas on how you can reduce your use of plastic, take a look at the sources below!

https://www.elizabethrider.com/10-easy-ways-to-use-less-plastic/

https://www.itv.com/news/2018-08-25/plastic-bag-charge-why-was-it-introduced-and-what-impact-has-it-had

https://www.thesun.co.uk/sun-selects/9812317/best-reusable-straws/

Recycling your packing at our Haslemere Boutique