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This year once again our team participated in a global movement called ‘Plastic Free July’. We shared some tips & tricks on how to reduce single use plastics on our Social Media platform. One of our team members went on a zero waste journey and reported about her struggles and successes.

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What happened since ‘Plastic Free July’

We blinked once or twice, all of the sudden it’s November and slowly everyone is getting into the Christmas Spirit. But wait, it’s actually only been a good quarter of a year since our instructor Adi completed the 2019 ‘Plastic Free July Challenge’.

In her final post about her ‘Plastic Free July’ experience Adi wrapped things up for us:

Avoiding single-use plastics on a small island is possible, but at the same time it can be very limiting. To be completely honest, I won’t be as strict on my plastic usage as I was for the month of July, but this experience has definitely provided me with a lot of new habits that I am planning to keep up on a permanent basis. From now on, before buying a product that comes in plastic packaging, I will ask myself if I really need it or if there is maybe a plastic free alternative.

Adrienne, Master Divers Instructor and Plastic Free July contestant.

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Of course, we were extremely curious to see how she got on with implementing her new habits into her everyday life (on a small tropical island) and here’s what she reports:

Shopping Habits

It has been a few months since I did the ‘Plastic Free July Challenge’ and Sarah just asked me what habits I kept after the challenge. I did some brainstorming but here are the main changes that I integrated in my daily life:

I am a lot more conscious about my shopping habits. So for instance, I stopped buying bread in the supermarket that was packed in plastic bags and instead I am now buying bread at the new German bakery (Zone B Café) which is close to work. It is definitely a massive improvement, because the bread is a lot nicer and it’s sold in paper bags which keeps it fresh. However I am still indulging in eating snacks, so I have definitely been buying some packs of crisps or biscuits.

I had a moment of bad conscious the other day when I bought some biscuits which were in multiple little plastic packs. I did end up buying them but I was very conscious of my purchase and its plastic impact instead of automatically adding it to my shopping basket.

Take-away Food vs. Homecooked Meals

Eating more in and more out: Instead of ordering take-away or getting food delivered to my house, I have been eating in more at those restaurants or cooking at home more regularly. I do try to have reusable plastic boxes in my bag if I know that I want take-away food – even though requires a bit more planning ahead.

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Actually, I have been very good at always bringing a reusable bag with me and not getting any new single-use plastic bags – to a point where I ended up having none of them left at home anymore. Since I was using them to collect my rubbish, I had to buy some rubbish bin bags to replace them.

Recycling

I started being more conscious of recycling my rubbish: I am collecting clean glass jars and plastic containers which I am now dropping off at my local zero waste shop – even if it means that I need to do a little detour on my way to work. Sometimes when I bring my lunch to work, I am also re-using a glass jar for this purpose.

Plastic-free Alternatives

Ever since July, I’ve been trying out some plastic free alternatives: I will admit that am still not ready to make my own shampoo, but I have spent quite some time checking out zero-waste blogs and websites to look for plastic-free alternatives for detergents or washing-up liquid. It is safe to say that I would have never invested some time in this type of research before the challenge.

Since I actually have some nice ‘Marseille’ soap at my house (thanks Mum!), I decided to use it to wash up my dishes. I am in the try-out phase at the moment, but I will of course keep you posted on this new option.

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Did you like this summary? Check out this blog post which we published back in 2018 to give you some ideas for a ‘Green Christmas’!

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Image credits: Plastic Free July Org, unsplash, private