The Sustainable Shop: The (waste free) future of shopping
There is a growing concept for consumers looking to reduce their waste and eliminate single use packaging from their lives, a shopping experience allowing you to bring your own containers and refill them over and over again. Picture this: You run out of dish soap and instead of tossing your bottle into the recycling wondering if it truly will be recycled, you bring it to your local refill shop, they refill it for you and you only pay for the product and not another bottle that you never really needed and that will ultimately just become waste in a matter of weeks. To sweeten the deal, the dish soap they filled your bottle with is free from any harmful ingredients, gets the job done, and is made right here in Canada.
The Sustainable Shop, a small and locally owned business in Orangeville, Ontario is one of many refilleries providing this low waste shopping experience. At The Sustainable Shop, not only can you refill your dish soap, you can refill many household products including bath & body products, hand soaps, lotions, skin care, cleaning products, organic dry foods, teas, herbs, coffee and more. This way of shopping has been gaining popularity in recent years, proving that there is a way around all of the single use packaging in today’s convenience based world. Collectively, refilleries have saved millions of single use bottles from entering landfills. Refilleries are expanding and opening in most cities and even in small towns. Having this kind of accessibility provides the opportunity to shop waste free to a large and vast population, making a big difference in waste reduction.
About The Sustainable Shop
We opened The Sustainable Shop in 2024 with the ambition to not only provide a waste free way of shopping in our hometown but also to ensure customers could shop with peace of mind knowing that all of the products on our shelves are made with clean and beneficial ingredients. Over the past almost year, we have had the pleasure of providing our community with the option to cut down their waste and purchase products they trust. We want our customers to feel confident using the products we carry in their homes without worrying about negative impacts on their family’s health or the environment. We work very closely with many small Canadian businesses with like minded intentions that are also interested in working towards a greener future and are mindful about the ingredients they use. There has been a lot of research and thought put into every product and ingredient that enters our store and we are proud to carry many local brands.
When we opened, we knew that we wanted to stay committed to a circular economy and we have had the pleasure of working with many businesses that provide the opportunity to make the products we carry “closed looped”. What this means is that the containers that the products are delivered to us in are sent back to our partners to be reused again. We recently sent back 6 empty 105L drums to be refilled and it is quite remarkable seeing how many litres we’ve refilled and how many single use bottles were avoided in the process and that’s just 6 out of many of the products we sell. Running a business is not for the faint of heart but it is so rewarding when we step back and take a look at how every refill we do adds up and makes a positive impact.
It has been such an uplifting journey and I can’t say enough about how incredible it has been to build relationships with our customers and our partners and even other local businesses looking to do their part for our Earth. Sometimes we find ourselves overwhelmed by the overconsumption and waste in today’s world so it is very inspiring to meet and converse with so many people that have a similar dream of what our future could look like if we all do our part and keep educating those around us. There is much to say about how big of a difference we can make when we work together. We have been very fortunate to have had an overwhelming amount of support and love from our community in just the first year. We are very excited to see where the future takes us.
If you haven’t had the opportunity to shop at your closest refillery, we encourage you to start small and try refilling one or two products and get to know the process and continue working towards reducing waste in your life. Every action counts.
Where To Find Us
Find almost all of our products online at www.thesustainableshop.ca and follow us on social media: Facebook / Instagram
