Packaging makes up about 1/3 of the average household’s garbage and accounts for approximately 13 percent of the price you pay for food. There are some easy steps you can take to save money and reduce the amount of garbage and recycling produced from packaging. Try bringing your own container to the store and buying your goods in bulk.
Packaging Facts from Portland State University:
- 20,000,000 pounds of foil packaging could be avoided if all Americans bought coffee from the bulk bin.
- One half pound of waste per family could be kept out of the landfill if the average American family of four bought peanut butter in bulk.
- 6,000,000 pounds of waste could be prevented if Americans purchased all their almonds in bulk for one month.
- Oatmeal purchased from the bulk bin can save five times the waste of its packaged equivalent.
If all Americans chose to buy bulk options when possible, we would save more than 26 million pounds of packaging waste in just one month according to Earth911. Try it on and see if you can do it.
Reasons to buy bulk:
- Items cost less than those of the same amount that are packaged.
- There is less transportation needed to ship.
- Bringing your own container that you reuse is better for natural resources.
- There is more flexibility in how much you buy.
- You get to see what you are buying.
- Bulk items take less space to store and less store labor to manage.
Look for bulk shopping options at stores in our area. Listing a business below does not mean that Thurston County endorses any of these companies.
Personal or home care products:
- Euphorium, Olympia
- The Olympia Food Coop, Olympia
- Radiance Herbs and Massage, Olympia
- Premier Salon and Spa, Olympia
Food:
Bayview Thriftway, Olympia- Buck’s Fifth Avenue/Culinary Exotica, Olympia
- FredMeyer, Lacey, Tumwater
- Tea Lady, Olympia
- The Olympia Food Coop, Olympia
- Top Food and Drug, Olympia
- WinCo Foods, Lacey
- Yelm Food Co-op, Yelm
Coming soon, the Zero Waste Home has also recently released a bulk shopping app available in iTunes and the Android Market. It is still in version 1.0 so they are working out the bugs. As soon as someone populates our region with the local options, it will be a terrific resource (hint, hint, wink, wink).
You might already be recycling much of packaging you bring home and that is great but not enough. Earth’s inhabitants consume the amount of natural resources one year that it takes the Earth to generate in over 1.5 years according the Global Footprints Network. When you bring your own container to the store, reusing it many times over, you are saving the resources that would go toward something new. So when you go to buy bulk, don’t forget your containers. The Olympia Food Coop has limited supplies of donated and washed containers for you if you ask.
Earth 911 has some good suggestions to get you started including choosing containers, how to read bulk price tags, and shopping.
For more tips on how to reduce your consumption, go to www.ThurstonSolidWaste.org and click on “Recycling & Reuse”.
