Recently updated on October 5th, 2024 at 12:58 pm
Those behind Boop hope to do what the ‘wonky’ fruit and veg ethos has done for food waste by repurposing some of the 90m beauty products discarded each year in the UK alone.
I’ve been reading content from Positive.News from the UK for a little over a year now and I often come away from an article feeling jealous. The UK is consistently moving forward with legislation—doing things that are only found in a climate activist’s dreams over here. I think a lot of what’s behind our problem stems from corruption in our government. Ever since the Supreme Court legalized bribery, we’ve been stuck as a country.
The Republican Senators in Congress have been paid by the NRA to never allow any type of regulations on guns to pass. Even though the facts show that when there was a ban on assault rifles in the past, shootings went way down. We’ve seen time and time again how cops are afraid to confront criminals with AR-15s and it makes absolutely zero sense for the average citizen to possess one! I’ve heard the argument that people in rural areas need them for groundhogs and other “varmints”, but why do you need to completely destroy a groundhog to kill it? It’s ridiculous!
Then you have members of both parties paid by the fossil fuel industry to block any meaningful attempt to combat climate change. The list goes on an on, making it very obvious that we will never grow as a country until we get money out of politics.
The cost of running for office alone is too high for an average person to afford. But, instead of having people who are already rich, and just want to increase their wealth, running, we need people from middle-class and poverty getting elected into office because they understand what it’s like for Americans who aren’t rich and they have an interest in passing legislation that will help regular people!
The UK is taking this big step to combat waste and do something to change it, but it wouldn’t happen in the U.S. with bribed officials and corporations running the country. It’s still fun to read about things they’re doing because living vicariously through them does help a little bit in terms of giving us hope for the future.
Here’s a story from Positive.News on how they’re combatting the waste that beauty supply manufacturers and retailers create by throwing products away. You won’t believe how many tons of moisturizer gets tossed out!
The beauty industry’s eye-watering waste problem is enough to make your mascara run – but a new online marketplace is tackling the issue head on by offering cosmetic seconds at bargain prices.
Boop is aiming to do what the ‘wonky’ fruit and veg ethos has done for food waste by repurposing some of the 90m beauty products thrown away each year in the UK alone.
That’s the weight of 650 doubledecker buses and equates to 4,500 tonnes of moisturiser, 1,000 tonnes of mascara, and four Olympic-sized swimming pools full of perfume. A tenth of that waste occurs in brands’ supply chains and 6.2% of discarded beauty goods are down to overproduction.
“A huge number of beauty products are destroyed each year by manufacturers and retailers without ever hitting the market,” confirmed Boop founder Yasmine Amr.
“Consumers and brands are becoming far more conscious of sustainability – and consumers don’t really care if their product doesn’t look perfect or has older packaging.”
Amr’s background in law led to her working as legal counsel for L’Oréal. Being on the inside of the beauty industry means she has witnessed first-hand how red tape and business processes contribute to wide-scale waste.
Consumers don’t really care if their product doesn’t look perfect or has older packaging
“Throughout my career, I would have people come to me asking what to do about products that had printing errors, slow-moving items which they didn’t want to store, or obsolete items. These were products that were perfectly fine to use,” said Amr.
France has already banned the destruction of unsold cosmetics, and similar legislation is under consultation for the EU and UK. Meanwhile Boop’s research indicates that 95% of people would happily buy stock deemed surplus or imperfect due to a labelling mishap, damage or changes to branding.
Its online range features mid to high-end brands with discounts of up to 70% on products that would otherwise be destined for landfill.
Three more ways in which wonky wrongs are being righted
Past-it promise
Despite huge progress around unnecessary ‘best before’ labels on food, they still appear on everything from hand wash gel to toothpaste. Step in health goods reseller Love Health, Hate Waste, which offers discounts of up to 90% on past-it products.
Support via surplus
Former UK prime minister Gordon Brown is behind the Multibank initiative which, like foodbanks, helps deprived families. Donations of essential household items such as bedding, clothing and toiletries, for example, are made up of surplus stock gifted by retail giants including Tesco and Amazon.
Deliciously odd
Wonky fruit and veg pioneers Oddbox led the way with its farm-to-fork subscription box service, so much so that produce lacking in the looks department has become a supermarket staple.
Support solutions in 2024
Positive News is helping more people than ever to get a balanced and uplifting view of the world. While doom and gloom dominates other news outlets, our solutions journalism exists to support your wellbeing and empower you to make a difference towards a better future.
But our reporting has a cost and, as an independent, not-for-profit media organisation, we rely on the financial backing of our readers. If you value what we do and can afford to, please get behind our team with a regular or one-off contribution.
Give once from just £1, or join 1,400+ others who contribute an average of £3 or more per month. You’ll be directly funding the production and sharing of our stories – helping our solutions journalism to benefit many more people.
Join our community today, and together, we’ll change the news for good.
This article was originally published on Positive.news and was republished here, with permission, under a CC BY-ND 4.0 license.
