All about… soap!

I want to start writing a series of spotlight articles about some of the products I stock, either individually or in groups which is the case today. It can be quite easy when you’re in the thick of it to lose perspective and lose sight of the basics: why some products are better for the environment and what we can do to reduce our impact so I’m really hoping these posts will help with that and we’re starting off today with soap!

As the past couple of years have show, soap can be vital in keeping us safe and protected from some harm, and while an element of bacterial exposure might be beneficial for us (I’m not a micro-biologist so that’s as far as I’ll go on that topic) we all wash our hands potentially more than a couple of times a day so what we keep at our sink or at the side of the bathtub plays a big role in how environmentally-friendly our bathrooms and washrooms are.

In essence we’ve got two options when it comes to soaps, liquids or solids, and both have different benefits, and both can be equally good for our planet with a little effort and to be honest not a lot of money. Let’s cover liquid soap quickly as there’s only really one way to ensure your environmental impact is as low as possible and that’s through refilling!

Rather than buying a new plastic pump bottle of liquid soap from the supermarket each time you run out you can take your existing bottles into shops like mine and get them refilled. Over the course of a year you could be saving an awful lot of bottles from needing to be bought and then recycled after just one use! In the shop I have 5 different scents of refillable hand soap ranging from the floral lavender & geranium through to the amazing smelling dragon fruit!

It’s a really straightforward process to refill bottles once you remember to bring them with you to the shop as I often forget to do. It doesn’t matter if they are clean, still have some old soap in them, they can be from any brand, any shape or size, glass, metal, plastic, it’s all good! I guess it’s quite a good analogy for life too, everyone’s different and wonderful and has a place.

We then weigh what you’ve brought in, fill it as much or as little as you’d like and then weigh it again. You pay for the difference and that’s worked out per millilitre so it’s totally flexible and works out to be great value when compared to other UK-based brands who source their ingredients responsibly and don’t add anything harmful or un-environmental, which leads us on nicely to bars of soap.

Bars of soap have had a bit of a bad rap in recent years. If you look at any supermarket soap section you usually have to look right at the bottom shelf to find bars, and usually there’s only one or two uninspiring options. Artisanal soap bars are still popular though and you can find many talented makers at markets and in gift shops (but sadly not in My Carbon Coach currently) and these often contain responsibly sourced ingredients, and naturally are locally made reducing their carbon footprint!

What I do offer in store are bars from two different but equally wonderful UK brands, Friendly and Faith In Nature. Both brands steer clear of including ingredients such as parabens, sulfates and SLS. SLS finds it’s way into a lot of products including toothpastes, it’s what adds that extra foaming-ness that we’ve come to expect from things these days as an indicator that they’re working. Friendly also don’t put palm oil into their products at all, whereas Faith In Nature does, but they insure to the best of their ability it’s from certified sustainable origin.

Palm oil would take up a whole article in itself so I’ll not side-track us here, but there is a continued problem with unchecked deforestation in some parts of the world to clear space for palm plantations. This deforestation is similar to the vast deforestation happening in places like the Amazon to create land for cattle ranching to provide the world with meat. I’ll leave that thought there!

These bars from both businesses are great value as they seem to last for a very long time. Friendly soaps are £2.50 a bar, and Faith In Nature ones are £3 for boxed options but I also stock bars with absolutely no packaging for only £1.95. I reckon that in our home a bar will last two months, but that is just with my wife and I as a family of two. The key is to look after them with a good draining soap dish or soap rest (both available from the shop too) but that’s an article for another week.

I hope that’s helped with what’s available to you and if you ever have questions I’m always around to help, or if you just want to pop in and give things a sniff to see which bar is your favourite then that’s cool too!