500,000 plastic bottles in 2021

Half a million bottles. Yes, you read correctly! If stacked on top of each other, the bottle chain would be 15.8x the size of Mount Everest.

This is the amount of ocean-bound plastic Tirtyl is planning to collect this year with our friends at Plastic Bank. It’s a lofty goal but one we’re determined to meet.

But Tirtyl Tabs already prevent plastic, surely that’s good enough?

It’s true, our Tirtyl products do help prevent plastic. By selling glass dispensers and hyper-concentrated tablets, there is no need to buy a plastic soap bottle ever again. However, the world is losing the battle against excessive plastic so we must all do a little extra. Here’s a quick snapshot of the problem.

• Humans consume a lot of plastic – 1 million bottles of plastic are purchased every minute
• We are producing 10x more than we can recycle – only 10% is recycled in Australia and 8% in the US. The remainder is sent to landfill, incineration or even worse, it enters our oceans.
• Governments and Multinationals are moving too slowly – the tiny nation of Rwanda was the first country to ban the single-use plastic bags in 2008. Only 69 of 195 countries have followed their lead.

“Never Doubt That A Small Group Of Thoughtful Committed Citizens Can Change The World: Indeed It's The Only Thing That Ever Has.” Margaret Mead.

It is very easy to blame governments and multinationals but we are all responsible. While it may be difficult to go plastic-free, there are small steps/swaps we can all take to reduce our footprint. Our mission at Tirtyl is to deliver products that are #madetounwaste. Too often, going green relies on compromises in cost, effectiveness or convenience. That’s why we’re so happy to release our introductory range of foaming hand soap tablets. We’ve worked so hard to make is irresistibly easy to make a more sustainable choice. As we say, better for your hands, wallet and planet.

How does the plastic collection work?

For every Tirtyl Tab sold, our friends at Plastic Bank collect the equivalent of one plastic bottle. For every glass bottle sold, they collect 8 plastic bottles. Plastics are collected by locals in developing coastal communities where the macroplastics problem is at its worst – eg. Indonesia, Haiti and the Philippines. Locals are paid a fair wage for their collection and the ocean-bound plastic is then reprocessed, reintroduced into the global manufacturing supply chain and tracked via block chain.

How can you help?

Keep making those small everyday changes to reduce your consumption and ensure your fully up to date with plastics recycling best practices in your local area. For those plastics you can’t avoid, you can choose to offset your plastics consumption through a direct contribution to Plastic Bank. If you’re enjoying our product, don’t forget that we have the world’s first triple referral program where we reward you with free refills, your friends with 20% off and the planet with 3lbs (1.36kg) of plastic collected.

What’s plastic negative?

It’s a relatively new term but we’re hoping it will catch on.

Let’s be clear - our products are not plastic-free. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a non-plastic foaming soap pump. Even the stainless-steel foam pumps have plastic intestines. On top of that, freight companies are addicted to using plastic wrap and plastic tapes. Despite our requests, our pallets and cartons are often secured with plastic straps and tapes, little of which can be recycled or repurposed.

However, our plastics collections program means we collect 10x more plastic than we sell. So by our calculations, we are positively plastic negative and are doing everything we can to play our part in solving the problem.