How Go Bamboo Started Replacing Your Everyday Plastic Products

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Promotion with Go Bamboo

A sustainable, Earth-friendly home starts with small swaps. Making the switch to bamboo products is a small step that can have a big effect. Plus, creating a greener atmosphere in your own home can help plant the seed in others who may see how well it can work for both people and the planet.

Go Bamboo was started by paying more attention to what was being bought in the weekly shop, making better choices about packaging and choosing non-plastic alternatives when available. This was going fine until the kids’ toothbrushes needed to be replaced. They were struck by the amount of plastic that goes into a toothbrush, plus the unnecessary packaging, and that there was no non-plastic alternative. Three or four of these are purchased each year so we thought, “How many is that over a lifetime?” In fact, 4.9 billion plastic toothbrushes are thrown away each year! It’s safe to say that no toothbrushes were bought that day and research began for non-plastic options, but there were none in New Zealand.

Bamboo is one of the most environmentally-friendly crops that exist today because it’s one of the fastest-growing plants in the world, growing up to 91cm per day! The plantation has a yield of up to 25 times that of a forest, it uses minimal water to grow, and it does not require pesticides or artificial fertilisers. That is why Go Bamboo first created natural children’s toothbrushes using bamboo as environmentally-friendly raw material.

The bamboo we use is panda-friendly. Moso bamboo is used for all of the bamboo products because it grows in lower elevations and is far from panda mountain habitats. Pandas neither eat it nor use it for making their homes.

Fortunately, Go Bamboo’s first product was pretty popular and the team thought, “Why couldn’t bamboo be used instead of plastic in more disposable items?” They then expanded the range to include other household items like pegs, veggie brushes and cotton buds. Go Bamboo is constantly looking for opportunities to provide simple and sustainable alternatives to the little things we all use every day.

The team is proud to say that Go Bamboo won a New Zealand Green Ribbon Award for waste minimisation, which honours outstanding contributions to protecting New Zealand’s environment.

Go Bamboo is just getting started and is looking forward to helping more people live more sustainably.