Plastic Free July is a global movement that encourages people around the world to reduce plastic consumption for a month to promote cleaner streets, to support the health of our oceans, and our communities. The campaign educates us around the importance of avoiding single use plastic, raising awareness of our everyday plastic usage, and incentivising us to make small lifestyle changes, bringing communities together to help reduce the impact of plastic on our planet.
Founded in 2011, supermarkets around the country are now heavily involved in supporting this campaign and in reducing plastic in their stores, starting with plastic bags and packaging. Morrisons will become the first UK supermarket to completely remove plastic carrier bags, including bags for life, from its shops. Waitrose revealed its refillable scheme by becoming the first national supermarket to integrate unpacked items into its regular aisle specific stores around the UK. The trial aims to understand whether customers could be persuaded to incorporate shopping for unpacked items in their routine “business as usual” shopping trips.
A key part of ensuring was to be adaptable to changing circumstances. It had already been cancelled in 2020, so our team were fully aware of what to expect if there was a repeat situation due to Covid.
There is no denying that these are ever-changing and unpredictable times, but after attending The White Label Expo we have faith that in-person events are not going anywhere! The truth is that no computer screen or digital slideshow can replace the innumerable benefits of meeting people in person and building relationships with them face-to-face. In-person events moving forward will look a little different and tradeshow planners and exhibitors will have to account for certain factors that were barely once considered.
Planning your first post-Covid event can be a challenging task, but we have a few tips on how we overcame this to ensure a positive outcome:
Sustainable Beauty
According to Zero Waste, 120 billion units of packaging are produced by the beauty industry every year. A shocking fact to reflect on for one moment – did you know that every piece of plastic still exists? Plastic sits in landfills for more than 1 000 years, and when we think of our favourite beauty products, that amounts to a lot of plastic – from the film packaging to the jar, tube, bottle, cosmetic palette, or lipstick holder – many of which we only use for the entirety of the product, and then discard into our bathroom bins.
Whilst steps have certainly been taken over the past few years to reduce our consumption of plastic – from microbeads to wet wipes, not enough is being done. 13 million tonnes of plastic are dumped into our oceans each year. The COVID-19 pandemic has also set us back. We all understandably, took to using single-use masks, and medical apparatus including vaccines and latex gloves haven’t helped – some are even coining the crisis the ‘Plastic Pandemic’.
The circulation of such rabid plastic consumption means that consumer demand to take sustainability seriously is high. It’s also why plastic-free beauty brands are standing in harmony. Plastic Free Beauty Day which takes place annually on June 17th was launched by Yolanda Cooper of We are Paradoxx in 2019, to highlight the industry’s dependency on single use plastic and to raise awareness around how aluminium packaging which can be infinitely recycled without losing its form and grade (unlike plastic).
Luxury fragrance brand Floral Street has traded in traditional plastic packaging for cartons created from sustainably sourced pulp, and subscription deodorant service Wild offers completely natural deodorants housed in anodised aluminium cases. Highstreets Lush opened “Naked” stores which are void of any plastic packaging. The brand initially opened these stores in Milan and Berlin, followed by the UK, based on their success.
An earlier pioneer in sustainability, along with The Body Shop, this ethical beauty brand is continuing its journey to becoming a zero-waste company with the launch of a new plastic packaging returns scheme to reward its customers for their eco-friendly attempts. The scheme also allows customers to return their plastic empties from any full-sized Lush product to be reused for future products. Whilst most of the brands plastic packaging is said to be made from recycled and recyclable plastic, the brand aims to take more ownership and give new life to its range of bottles, pots, and tubs with its latest initiative.
Working with Bespoke Advantage
Bespoke Advantage is a London based international beauty brand consultancy. We are a team of experts, associates and business partners specialising in supporting our clients – award-winning entrepreneurs, well established beauty and wellness businesses, retailers, investors, trade bodies and embassies – in developing and growing their brands across the beauty and wellness marketplace. If you are looking to launch a beauty or wellness brand or you are looking for support in expanding your brand across markets, GET IN TOUCH.
