Meet the companies offering transparency on waste

Each day around the world, nearly one million plastic bottles are bought per minute. That equates to 1.5 billion plastic bottles per day, most of which aren’t recycled, and our reliance on single-use plastic bottles is still growing. Eager to do its part for the planet and curb plastic pollution, companies have come together to launch the #ReplaceTheBottle campaign to encourage consumers to ‘go zero’. In an effort to create a community of activists who also want to support global change, the campaign is all about transparency, and sharing responsibility for recycling.

But what does that mean? For Biovène Barcelona, it’s about finding plastic-free alternatives like solid bar versions of beauty products, which offer beauty lovers like us a solution to traditional products typically packaged in plastic. But knowing that what happens to product packaging after they’re discarded is equally as important, Biovène works together with Cleanbeautyinitiative.org, raising awareness and hosting local beach cleanups in Barcelona, Valencia and Malaga, Spain, with plans to expand these types of projects on a global scale. The company also works with environmental e-commerce entities such as Nozama – a recycling model and green delivery e-retailer.

“Consumers may soon start to demand e-commerce companies take extra responsibility and collect their household waste at the time of delivery,” says Biovène Barcelona CEO, Erik Lambert. “It’s easy to shop more when you feel better knowing your waste is processed and recycled properly, and not ending up in our waterways.”

Nozama aims to change the current economic model that is based on the principle of selling mass consumption products without regard to what happens to the packaging after usage. In order for communities to be sustainable, it’s all about responsible production and consumption. Nozama ensures that whatever is sold through its online platform, like Biovéne Barcelona’s solid shampoo bars, are recycled, while also providing at-home recycling with its Nozama Pick Up app. Nozama partners with companies to offer them RaaS – Recycling as a Service – to recover and recycle the packaging of their products. In doing so, this enables companies to be sustainable, while also allowing customers to track their waste.

So far, approximately 2,660kg of CO2 and 3,012kg of recovered materials have been saved through Nozama recycling and the use of eco-friendly means of delivery and pickups. Such efforts just go to show that with the right procedures in place, it really is possible to create a cleaner future.