This week, Sam from HQ takes you through some of the main changes we have made to our range over the last few years, how we see a greener future within skincare and a few little things to look out for.

If you live by the coast like we do at Wideye HQ, or have been down to visit over the last few weeks, you will have probably witnessed the mountains of rubbish that have been discarded all over our beautiful coastline. With this in mind and the fact that it is plastic-free July (For those that didn’t know), We thought we would talk a little bit about the steps we have made towards a plastic-free future.

We are constantly looking at ways in which we can adapt to a more sustainable future. Whilst developing our products to be more sustainable has been a tricky process, we believe we are headed in the right direction. In 2019 we decided to ditch all plastic containers and make the jump towards glass and aluminum. These can be recycled time after time without any loss in properties. Whilst there are pros and cons to both of these, with Glass notably being a lot heavier in transport compared to aluminum, they are a much better alternative to plastic.  

Another big change we made was introducing our cardboard packaging for deodorants. Most deodorants come in a hard plastic casing with lots of little components making them impossible to recycle, they also only sit on our shelves for an average of 3 weeks. With such a short life-span, products like these must be re-thought throughout the industry. We believe our cardboard containers for these, are as sustainable as you can get, we couldn't be happier with them!

Honesty is at the forefront of our goals, whilst we don’t use any ‘single-use plastics’ we are still yet to find alternatives for our pumps and some lids, which is why we offer the option to purchase a lot of our products ‘pump free’. We believe that the future lies in refills, as this is what is ultimately going to lend itself to the least amount of harm to the environment. Another area we are looking at is, developing products that can be consumed without the need for packaging altogether, whilst this is an easy solution for things like hand soaps, we think there is potential with other products as well!  

Looking at the global cosmetics and beauty industry as a whole, it produces 120 billion units of packaging each year, the majority of this not even recycled. Whilst lots of large companies have pledged to ditch plastics over the next few years, we believe it is equally important for smaller businesses like ourselves to push for the move as changes can happen a lot faster! 

To finish off, we thought we would mention a few things that are worthy of a reminder for reducing your use of plastics. 

Looking at other brands over a number industries, we have found many to claim to be completely ‘plastic-free’ when this is not the case, so make sure you keep an extra keen eye on things when you are next scrolling through your news feed on the lookout for a sustainable purchase. 

We would also suggest looking around the shops you next walk in to and try to spot which plastics are being used, especially when it comes to the bags! Once you start investigating, it’s amazing the amount of plastic contained in things that you would never have thought. One that surprised us was chewing gum!

If you live by the coast, we would highly recommend joining your local beach clean, this is something we at HQ participate in regularly, it's amazing how fulfilling these can be! They are also a great way to meet like-minded people.

 We’d love to hear your thoughts on what we are doing to tackle the plastic problem, so please feel free to drop us a message if you have anything you’d like to mention!