How much does it cost (or save) to become less/zero waste?
Of course, I also want to know it! Therefore, I decided to calculate it for you š
How much does it cost (or save) to become less/zero waste?
Of course, I also want to know it! Therefore, I decided to calculate it for you š
For cleaning products, Iāve been calculating the cost of each of the product Iām using and compared to a similar product. Of course, I did not compare the cheapest brand from the supermarket; but took the price from a well-known ecological brand here in Europe.
Iāll guide you through the table.
If you buy one kg or litre of each ingredient, youāll pay about 42 euro for all of it (GREEN).
In the uncolored part of the table, Iāve calculated the quantity of each ingredient I needed for each of my cleaning product and calculated the final price per cleaning product (ORANGE).Ā I compared it to the price of the ecological brand I used to buy.
In conclusion, I saved 3x more money for the same amount of cleaning product. And I still have enough ingredients to make another batch of product!!!
In their book (I didnāt find the tables on internet), the āfamille zero dechetā also compared the cost of cosmetics and cleaning products before and after they became zero waste. They found a factor 2 (saving 2x more money).
I realized that the zero-waste concept, is often coupled to healthier food, fair-trade and ecology. We all have our āspecialtyā or our motivation to live more ecologically, e.g. one eats less meat, another cares about water and energy waste, do not fly, or reduce plastics and waste volume.
Ideally, we should tackle ecology from all anglesā¦ but Iām not there yet, and I’m not sure Iāll ever be able to claim that I donāt have any ecological footprint. So, letās do what we can/want without culpability feelings. š
Letās go back to the price. Packaging-free shops offers often biological food. If possible, they propose food produced locally. This implicates also that most of fruits and vegetables are seasonal and not flying of sailing oceans and seas to arrive to your plate. Sorry, strawberries are not growing in winterā¦
Iāve compared prices of few ingredients, between āmy packaging-free shopā, buying bio in a regular supermarket, or in a bio-supermarket.
If you buy food with packaging, someone will pay the packaging you getā¦ and it will probably not be the big multinational.
If we look at the comparison here above, buying bio is IN NOT MORE EXPENSIVE in specialized shops (packaging-free or bio-supermarket). As everywhere, supermarket offers more choice, and therefore different price range. However, if we all only go to the supermarket, small shops will disappearā¦
AND, if you go to a zero-waste shop, you will not be tempted by offers and you might save money by not buying plenty of other things which were not on your shopping list but taste so good š. If so, donāt forget your (home-made) reusable shopping bags!
If you want to save money, try the dishwasher and laundry powder. Both will be done in 10 min!
Anali
Eco With Kids 