Tags
Cleaning products, Clothes washing soap, Dish washing soap, Neutral, Packaging, Plastic recycling
Do you cringe every time you toss a huge plastic soap container into the trash or the recycle bin? I do, a bit, because I think how much plastic is discarded every day and what a problem it is to dispose of it all, even with good recycling in place. (According to the Clean Air Council, 2.5 million plastic bottles are thrown away every hour… just in America! One-third of American waste is packaging.)
What a pleasure it was to walk into the local IperSoap store (where you can find the elusive dusting wands I crave) and see a new display for something called Neutral:
What a great idea! You buy the plastic bottle one time, and then take it back to the store to be refilled with your cleaning product. I bought the hand dish-washing soap, and while it’s not the best I ever used, it’s better than the inexpensive stuff I usually settle for. So far they seem to sell just dish and clothes washing products, but that’s a great start, since those products usually come in really big plastic bottles. As you can see, the product itself is not very expensive.
I hope there will be more of this in the future. There are so many things that could be sold without fresh packaging every time. Here in Italy we use about a thousand different cleaning products (and spend a lot of time cleaning)… so it would be great to see more products sold this way. We’d be doing old Mother Earth a great big favor.
An Ex-Expatriate 
Who is the manufacturer of this machine. where Can i buy it???
I haven’t the faintest idea – but perhaps the Iper Soap people could tell you? Their website is here. It’s in Italian, but Google or Babelfish will translate it for you… sort of.
Oh my. What a fine idea, one that will never fly in the US, I think. We have so many different brands competing for supremacy in the cleanliness department, so many detergent nuances, and a plastics industry that will send an army of lobbyists to prevent this crazy re-use idea from taking root. What? Me? Cynical?
Nah, you’re not cynical (lol). I’m not sure this will even fly here, where we also have a huge # of cleaning products, and an army of women who use them religiously. But we also seem to have, or to be developing anyway, a more eco-sensitive population. So stay tuned. I wish the soaps were thicker; they work fine but are thin – I like a thicker more viscous soap. Never satisfied!
I haven’t seen one of these around my neck of the woods, but it looks like a fantastic idea! I so hate packaging, and even though you can recycle a lot of it, I remain deeply sceptical that it actually ends up where it is supposed to.
just bought the laundry soap today (purple!) and will give it a try. It looks kind of thin, but we’ll see. I share your doubt about the ultimate ending place of ‘recycled’ materials.
I can totally picture the casalinghe trying to figure it out but with all our backwardsentality we sometimes implement neat ideas
It’s a GREAT idea, just one of many, many, many Italian great ideas.
I hate plastic bottles!
Somewhere I read that there is a one mile wide flotilla of them in the ocean. Heartbreaking!
But trying to escape them in the States is really tough – Everything comes in plastic. I happily pay more for what comes in glass – and wish everyone could/would do the same.
I think you’re referring to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_Garbage_Patch) (sorry, you have to copy and paste to your browser). Glass presents its own set of environmental problems, but at least it’s likely to be used over and over, which is an improvement over plastic.
I can’t wait to see these set up in Bennet or Esselunga where we usually shop. They’re the big chain stores, so they should set an example and start everyone on throwing less plastic into the landfills. I’ve even stopped buying laundry softener because with hanging clothing out on the line, they still get a little stiff anyway.
It would be great to see the big chains jump on this wagon. I can’t bring myself to give up the softener – I love the way it smells! If I don’t use it the clothes usually smell like the neighbor’s smoky fire (don’t get me started!). Welcome back from your great trip!!
We have one of these in Lucca and nearby Fornaci di Barga. When I am here next time I will try it. Thanks!
Hope your branch has it, and that the soap is acceptable…
One of those finally made it into our Coop. It was loads of fun watching people try to figure out how to use it. They finally sent a clerk to oversee the initial days.
I expect there’s a lot of over-fill from time to time, and soapy messes to clean up. It’s kind of like self-check-out at the Iper-Coop, no? Takes twice as long and requires a full-time cashier to straighten out all the errors and confusion – but it is fun.