The shampoo bar : showing that voting with our money works
I discussed in a previous post about reducing plastic in both the business and at home. One of the areas I struggled with was bathroom products, particularly shampoo.
I first tried a shampoo bar maybe 3 years ago, when they were much less commonplace and the tiny pebble bar I purchased cost £14. 😳
I have tried several different ones since then and couldn't get on with them, either I just couldn't get out of the 'transition' period from the commercial shampoos to natural or just hadn't found one to suit my hair. Thankfully, another solution then started to become available - refill shops - and I switched to refilling my old bottles with shampoo from shops like Yard Market.
This past year, however, it's been more difficult to get to those shops (I wish one would open up in Walton!) however I spotted a new thing on the shelves of my local Wilkinson - a shampoo bar by Garnier Ultimate Blends.
Up until that point, all the shampoo bars I'd seen had been made by small companies aiming to reduce the world's plastic waste but the large shampoo manufacturers hadn't caught on. The wonderful thing about small business is they can have a product in our hands so much quicker than large companies, and in doing so often show the bigger manufacturers what sells and works particularly with plastic free and eco alternatives.
This bar is £4, (Feb 2021) comes in a card box, smells good, lathers well, cleans well and is just as good as their liquid shampoo. The point of this post isn’t a product review, I’m putting this part in to illustrate the product isn’t a compromise on the less environmentally friendly alternative, nor is it for show. Of course if you’re already using bars from one of those smaller manufacturers keep doing it.
The reason I find this so exciting is that the niche product I mentioned at the beginning is no longer niche. It proves that voting with our money works as there is now a bar on the shelves of a huge retailer at an affordable price that people can switch to instantly.
Imagine the whole shampoo section of your supermarket being plastic free and all the waste avoided. It’s really is powerful what simply spending our money can do.
Image: Alice Gabb