Eleven tips for cutting plastic out of your everyday life

Don’t worry though – we’ve got you covered. Here are our eleven easy tips for saying no to plastic.

Don’t forget to take your reusable coffee cup with you. Most people don’t know that takeaway coffee cups can’t be recycled because they have a plastic lining. Got a cold? Use a hanky instead of tissues. Yes, we know that tissues are made from paper, but the packaging usually contains some kind of plastic. Going for a drink? Ask the bartender to leave the straw, cocktail stirrer and little umbrella out. Is there a film you’d like to see, or an album you’d like to listen to? Why not download them instead of buying hard copies packaged in plastic? Protect your phone – and the oceans. Get a glass screen protector – they’re stronger than the plastic ones, and have the added advantage of, y’know, not being made from plastic. Dry lips? Use a lip balm from a tin rather than a tube. Get a reusable bottle to save you from buying bottled water. It might seem obvious, but in Britain we use over 35 million plastic bottles a year, so using a reusable bottle could help cut out a huge amount of single-use plastic. Chew-se your chewing gum wisely – many brands of gum contain plastic. Raise the bar with your toiletries – use soap and shampoo in a bar form rather than bottled. Relight your fire – using matches instead of disposable plastic lighters. Use dishwasher powder from a cardboard box to save all those individual plastic wrappers.

We hope these tips will help you cut down on your plastic use – why not share them with your friends and family, and encourage them to try and cut down how much plastic they use? If all of us gave it a go, we could make a big difference.

Don’t forget – when you switch to green energy from Ecotricity, we’ll donate up to £50 to the Marine Conservation Society to help them with their work combatting the plastic problem. You can find out more here.