Green Store News: Update

A quick Green Store News update for you following on from November’s article here. One of Life Goggles’ friends, Big Green Smile sent us a couple of updates just in time for Christmas.

Lokta paper
Most online stores offer a gift wrapping service but Big Green Smile now use Lokta paper to wrap its products. Lokta paper is made from the bark of the Lokta (or Daphne papyracea) plant, which grows in the Himalayas and is abundant in supply. You can also get a gift card made from 75% elephant dung and 25% recycled paper.

Delivery offsetting
Again, while not revolutionary but new and most welcome to Big Green Smile, is the option to carbon offset your delivery. While offsetting is often used as greenwash, in this case I think it’s great. You can’t avoid delivery with online shopping so having the option to help others abroad and offset your carbon emissions is a good idea. Click here to find out more about this scheme and the sort of people that are helped by this sort of offsetting.

Method Bowl Patrol Eco Product Review

Method continues its domination of our homes, bringing out a toilet cleaner to go along with its Bathroom Flushable Wipes that we loved at Life Goggles.

Called Bowl Patrol (love the name), method once again shows how different it is by using lactic acid (a mineral dissolver) as its cleaning power. And it works well. What also surprised us was that the cleaner was both coloured (blue) and had a strong smell. Most of its products only have a faint scent and even if are coloured in the bottle, don’t leave a coloured mark. The blue does help you to know where you’ve squirted it under the rim and the smell is okay, not as fresh as some artificial scents but pleasant enough.

As usual, the design of the bottle is first class. Simple, but effective, it’s easy to squeeze the cleaner under the rim and leave it for ten minutes before cleaning away. And the good thing is it won’t harm any fish or anything in the sea after you flush.

Available from places like John Lewis, Waitrose and Big Green Smile, you can look at method’s website to find more stockists. It costs around £3.00.

Will Carpet Save £156m Of Energy?

Apparently carpeting a room could help UK 26 million households save £60 each (around £156m) in heating bills this winter. Carpet insulation is 10 times higher than that of hard flooring and is one of the most effective thermal insulators.

As carpets have low heat conduction, up to 30 days heating every year can be saved in the home, resulting in up to 6% of energy-saving costs On average, a UK family’s heating bill is now £1,000 per year, which could represent a saving of £60 per household or £156 million across all UK households.

Check our more information on Fun On The Floor, a new campaign that, according to the press release, redefines the art of carpeting, through showing the latest and greatest new ideas in fluffy flooring in a completely new light.

Denim Jeans Cushion Eco Product Review

New friends to Life Goggles, Eco Emporia, sent us its Denim Jeans Cushion for review.

The company’s straplines are “desirable things from discarded objects” and “handmade by craftspeople with a passion for recycling”, and a quick look around the website you’ll find this to be true. Nothing exemplifies this more than this denim cushion. Basically it’s a pair of old Levi 501 jeans that has been made into a cushion cover.

And it works brilliantly well. The waistband of the jeans is the gap to get the cushion in and out so here aren’t any zips or buttons (unless they’re left on the jeans - each one is unique). Maybe it’s because of the quality of the source material but it’s also very soft and you don’t notice that you’re leaning on denim or anything different from a normal cushion really. It’s very well made too and when you buy one it comes with a gift card with an optional message if it’s a gift but also has something explaining who made it and their background. In this case it was Sarah Baulch.

Having something new made from something old means the quirks are incorporated into the product. For this cushion it means the pockets are still there and if you want you can put things in them, like er the remote control.

No matter how much I liked the cushion, I loved the surprise gift that came with it too. At the risk of spoiling the ’surprise’, I received a set of small envelopes made from old comics. They’re great, I don’t even want to use them to be honest, just show them off to people. It brings back great memories of my youth and while emailing is more eco-friendly than sending letters, it’s time to get that fountain pen out and send a few messages to people I think.

And finally, the packaging, gift cards and even the paper flower used in the packaging is all made from recycled materials, something all companies should aspire to do.

The Denim Jeans Cushion costs £30 from Eco Emporia.

Interview With Simon Duffy From Bulldog Natural Grooming

We’re a fan of Bulldog’s cosmetics here at Life Goggles, such as its Post Shave Balm and Shower Gel (you can find all the reviews here), so we thought we’d have a chat to its co-founder, Simon Duffy.

Tell us a bit about your background and how Bulldog started off?
We started Bulldog to take on the big brands in the men’s skincare world and create an entirely new category – natural grooming – where ethics, purity and efficacy are the core focus. The range includes shaving, cleansing and skincare products. You will never find parabens, sodium laureth sulfate, artificial colours or synthetic fragrances in our products.

This is our first proper business venture if you discount countless failed teenage money-making schemes. We started working on Bulldog part time in November 2005, founded the business in February 2006, resigned from our jobs in May 2006 and launched nationwide in Sainsbury’s in July 2007. Bulldog is now available nationwide in Sainsbury’s, Waitrose, Tesco, Superdrug, Ocado, Debenhams, Whole Foods, and Planet Organic.

Prior to founding Bulldog, Simon was an innovation and branding expert who helped the likes of Coca-Cola, Starbucks, and Samsung to create new products and Rhodri Ferrier worked in finance, and was involved in organising corporate mergers and acquisitions.

Why focus just on men?
When we used to visit the male grooming aisles of the UK supermarkets, we actually found it a very boring category. What we saw were: “for men” versions of women’s products; boring functional products that were all the same colours, styles and had the same chemical heavy formulations, and very little character. All these brands take themselves way too seriously. Unlike other categories, there are no toiletries brands that men really love. Instead it’s just stuff we have to buy.

From a consumer point of view, Bulldog was nowhere and then suddenly available in lots of high street shops, I presume that’s not the case?
I’d love to say it was an overnight success, but we have been working hard for three years to get this far. What’s more, we have only just begun our journey and we know there is a long way for us to go to achieve our mission of pioneering natural grooming for men in the UK

What’s the male ‘beauty’ market like at the moment? And how do environmentally friendly products fit into that?
Overall the “male beauty market” is really boring. Mainly this because of the unisex compromise that both dominates and commoditizes the current options available for men. Next time you try shopping for male skincare products count how many options are actually “for men” versions of female products and brands.

Environmentally friendly products have a key role to play in expanding the options for men. Lots of men are keen to avoid controversial ingredients that have been linked with everything from skin irritation to male infertility. Lots of men care about the environment and the are concerned about the chemicals they are washing down their plug holes. At the moment the overall size of the environmental products niche is small, but it is growing year on year.

Do men really care about what goes into their products?
Our research shows that an increasing number of men do care and I think the larger companies will find it increasingly harder to fool most men with their “green-washing” tactics.

We get great feedback from men on our website. For instance, lots of men tell us that they find the Bulldog’s approach of using alternative natural ingredients gives them a shave that they don’t get from shave gels that include sodium laureth sulfate and other known skin irritants.

You’re very open about your ingredients, why?
It’s a key part of what we believe, and it’s how we think all companies should operate in this market. Many food and drink companies now list out ingredients like saturated fats, salt and calories on the front of pack so that people can make informed decisions about their health. We think this should also take place in the toiletries market so that consumers can make informed decisions about whether to purchase or avoid products containing ingredients like parabens and sodium laureth sulfate.

How do you source your ingredients?
Ethically, sustainably, and from natural sources whenever possible.

Competitors like Dr Bronner for example have very few ingredients, you seem to have a lot with chemical-sounding names, why is that?
We fully disclose all our ingredients and explain why we use them and where they are from on our website www.meetthebulldog.com. Often the long Latin names are for one of the twenty two essential oils we use across our entire range. We have to write them in this way due to government regulation. For example – Dipterocarpus Turbinatus is actually Balsam Oil. We use ten essential oils in our Lemon & Bergamot shower gel so this takes up a major part of the overall ingredient list for this product. Most of our products contain between seven to ten essential oils.

We only use non-natural ingredients in the exceptional cases where there are no viable natural alternatives, and only then when we are sure they are safe and mild. We are continually working to push the naturalness of our products and hope to introduce a new preservative system and increase the percentage of natural ingredients in our products later this year. This is an area of emerging science and we stay on top of any breakthroughs.

Who do you view as your competitors? Everyone, just the other organic ranges or just the non-organic ranges?
The aim that we have set ourselves is “To Pioneer Natural Grooming For Men”. Over the next five years our goal is to inform and educate men about the benefits of natural ingredients and reduce the number of man-made chemicals in Britain’s bathrooms. We see ourselves competing across UK retail with major players like L’Oreal, Nivea and Gillette.

Environmentally friendly products are seen as more expensive than traditional ones, but yours isn’t, why is that the case?
Our whole range is priced between £2.99 and £5.99. That’s because we don’t want to limit the appeal of Bulldog by making it too expensive for regular men who shop in places like Sainsbury’s, Waitrose, Tesco or Superdrug. Our mission is to pioneer natural grooming for men. To do this we need to provide viable alternatives to the likes of Nivea, L’Oreal and Lynx. Price is an important factor for our shoppers, and especially so in the difficult financial times we currently find ourselves in.

How does bottling, packaging and delivery fit in with your philosophy?
Our primary green credentials stem from the way in which we formulate our products. We are trying to remove as many man-made chemicals as possible from the everyday grooming products that men use. As far as our carbon footprint is concerned, we aren’t that innovative yet, but we are different. Unlike the vast majority of our competitors, we manufacture all of our products and its packaging here in the UK. It would certainly be cheaper for us to import packaging from China and have the packs filled in Eastern Europe, but it certainly wouldn’t help the environment. One criticism we have of ourselves is that we probably don’t communicate this fact as clearly to consumers as we could.

All of our products are packaged in 100% recyclable packaging, and we are working closely with our packaging partner to explore the inclusion of post-consumer-recycled plastic in our bottles and tubes. This is more of a challenge than you would expect, particularly if you want to manufacture in the UK.

You seem to be growing and growing, what difficulties have you faced and what barriers are there to further expansion?
The major challenge for Bulldog is getting the name out there and convincing people to give the products a try. This is really tough because all our competitors are large multi-national corporations who have massive marketing budgets, huge advertising campaigns, and the deep pockets required to fund price promotions in-store.

We compete by being different. First of all we knew we had to create amazing natural products. We are relentless in making sure that all our products have a great performance. All the feedback we’ve had has been very positive.

Secondly we launched as Bulldog. The Bulldog represents all of the positive attributes of men. He may not have a rippling six-pack, in fact he’s a little overweight and quite wrinkly, but he’s also tenacious, loyal, honest, hard working and protective. He is “Man’s Best Friend” and we probably all like to think that we have a bit of the bulldog spirit.

If men want to buy affordable natural grooming products with brilliant performance, that are also free from controversial ingredients, then we are the only brand available. We have a real point of difference.

What’s next for Bulldog?
Innovation is the lifeblood of brands and we are constantly searching out and testing new natural ingredients. We set very tough standards on both efficacy and naturalness which allows us to be very focused when reviewing possible new directions.

In terms of building our distribution we are taking it one step at a time, but we are looking to substantially build our distribution and hope that in the next three to four years you’ll be able to buy Bulldog anywhere you might pick up a shave gel or shower gel.

How about doing a deodorant? It’s hard to find good, environmentally friendly ones!
We have a further 10 products in our pipeline for the next 12 months and this includes a brilliant natural deodorant that will open up an entirely new market for us in male grooming. Innovation is key to the development of Bulldog and we will be pushing hard to deliver amazing new products for UK consumers.

Thanks to Simon and Patrick Hobbs for sorting the interview out.

Green Goes With Everything By Sloan Barnett - Green Book Review

Green Goes With Everything by Sloan Barnett - Simple Steps to a Healthier Life and a Cleaner Planet is another great green household book if you don’t have one already.

Sloan is the Green Editor for KNTV in San Francisco, and wife of the CEO of Shaklee (prepare for lost of endorsements!), and the book is very interesting, from when her son was diagnosed with chemically induced asthma and what steps she took to remove the toxins from her home.

The book is well researched, and has a great comprehensive directory in the back that I will be using to help stock up and decorate my new house. It is a little wordy, sometimes just wishing she would get to the point, and when she does, not hammer it home quite so much. It’s similar to many other green lifestyle/household books I’ve read, but if you don’t have one and are looking for one single book to use as a resource for greening your household then this is excellent. Each chapter (such as Clean Body, Clean Baby, Clean Food) has Five Green-Hot Tips at the end that makes dipping in and out easy. Also ideas to make going green cheaper and save money are also useful.

You can watch a 6 minute video about Green Goes With Everything below, where Sloan explains the principles behind her book and what made her to discover what she discovered. It’s actually a pretty good short video that will explain what the book is about and quick tips for you to get started.

Overall it’s useful, I would imagine eye-opening to the average consumer, has great short tips and a very useful resources section. It costs around $13.57 in hardback from Amazon, or $9.59 for the Kindle version.

Green People Organic Homme Stay Cool Deodorant Eco Product Review

We all love to smell nice and keep the sweat away and Male Organics sent me some Green People Organic Homme Stay Cool Deodorant to test, part of the same range as the shaving gel I gave to Jez to test.

It’s free from aluminium, parabens, ethyl alcohol and artificial fragrances and full of essential oils to kill the bacteria that cause body odour, floral waters to restrict bacterial growth and herbal extracts to soothe delicate skin. All very nice and as it’s all natural it’s suitable for people who may be prone to eczema and psoriasis.

I don’t usually use roll on deodorants, I’ve mostly been using the pump spray Bionsen deodorant, but I thought I’d give it a go and it’s not as bad as I thought. The deodorant itself smells exactly the same as the shampoo I mentioned which isn’t a good thing for me as I’m not the biggest fan of that smell.

It works okay, but there’s nothing amazing here to be honest, you’ll still sweat. I got better results with Bionsen and the smell was much better although if you apply the Green People roll on more often it works much better.

Green People Organic Homme Stay Cool Deodorant costs £6.99 for 25ml (2.5 fl oz) from Male Organics.

Next Page »