Plastic is so 2017

Our oceans are being taken by plastic, coming from the wrappers on our foods, synthetic materials and so on. Basically, a big fat plastic soup! Some facts:

• We’ve produced plastic as heavy as 1 billion elephants since the 1950s. Even more staggering is the amount that has rapidly become waste. Just 9% of this plastic has been recycled.
• “If we continue with our plastic habits, the oceans will have more plastic than fish by 2050.” – Ellen McArthur Foundation
• Our plastic waste has created a gigantic “plastic soup” in the Pacific of up to 15 million square kilometers – almost the size of Russia, and its expanding with 8 football fields per second!
• One million sea birds and 100,000 marine mammals are killed annually from plastic in our oceans.
• Virtually every piece of plastic that was ever made still exists in some shape or form (with the exception of the small amount that has been incinerated).

On May 1st, we took matters into our own hands and marched up to our local supermarket Albert Heijn and presented them with all the unnecessary plastic they use on foods with the message that Plastic is so 2017.

The idea: 
We wanted to let our voices be heard by taking action and ripping the plastic packaging off our shopping, and leave it at the supermarket to deal with.

The hope:
We hoped this action would help raise awareness and exert pressure on supermarkets like Albert Heijn to stop using plastic.

Well, our point was taken and on July 9th we were invited by the AH for a chat over this issue! High fives all around for the Goat Gang! We took all the ideas you guys sent us, gathered some information about plastic in general and headed to AH headquarters. We were welcomed by head of communications and a sustainability specialist. They were very interested in all that we had to say and thankful for all the ideas. They told us they are on a great journey towards becoming a sustainable powerhouse. Plastic reduction, vegan assortment, health and recycling are all topics that are on their daily agenda and they are going to keep in touch. We are very curious to see what they will do in the coming months and if they are going to make the necessary change! Thank you to all that were involved in this great project. Taking action helps and every little thing you do can make a massive impact!

• Reuse! as much as you can! This goes for plastic bottles, shopping bags, soap bottles… It’s all a matter of habit. We can’t leave the house without our reusable water bottle and sandwich box!
• Avoid! We got our point across at the supermarket – those guys just use way too much plastic – and encourage us too! You can change that by avoiding products that come with unnecessary wrapping, or skipping the plastic bags for picking your veggies.
• Act! This one we cannot stress enough – You. Can. Change. Things. As long as you take action, results are a matter of time! You could organize a clean up at your local beach or park for example. Get a bunch of friends together and use your voices! Your favourite take-out is still using plastic containers – call them, email them, stop by the owner’s house at night – kidding, don’t do that. But you get the point, be an inspiration to others around you and watch it spread!

Check us in action right here: