Pioneering Sustainable Beauty with Jo Chidley

Jennifer Norman:
Hello, beautiful humans. Welcome to The Human Beauty Movement Podcast, your source for hope, healing, happiness, and humanity. My name is Jennifer Norman. I'm the founder of The Human Beauty Movement and your host. This podcast is here to guide you on your journey of self-love, empowerment, soul alignment, and joy. With each episode, I invite beautiful humans from all corners of the globe to join me for open conversations about their life lessons and the important work that they are doing to help heal humankind. Take a moment now to subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode. I'm so glad you're here joining me for today's show.

Jennifer Norman:
Now, some of you may know that The Human Beauty Movement happens to be a Certified B Corp. Others of you might be wondering, what the heck is a B Corp? Well, Certified B Corps make a deep commitment to uphold really high standards when it comes to social and environmental responsibility. That means that beyond profits, B Corps prioritize purpose, people, and the planet, going above and beyond to ensure their businesses serve the greater good. Now, I've been fortunate enough to host several B Corp company founders on this show. Their companies are based all over the world, and they champion amazing social and environmental work across different industries.

Jennifer Norman:
Today, it's my honor to welcome a fellow founder from the beauty industry. Jo-Anne Chidley is the founder of two companies, Reposit and Beauty Kitchen. I admire Jo so much because she is working to make the beauty industry so much cleaner and healthier. Jo is known as a pioneer of sustainable beauty. She's been championing sustainable innovation. She's a circular economy expert, a chemist and an herbal botanist. And she's joining me all the way from Scotland to chat about her views on what it means to live beautifully. Welcome to the show, Jo.

Jo Chidley:
Hi, Jennifer. Thank you very much for inviting me. I'm looking forward to it.

Jennifer Norman:
Yes, it is a delight to see you. I know that we see each other in the B Corp community through the B Corp Beauty Coalition. But first, I want everybody to get to know you. You have to tell me, first of all, how is it in Scotland today?

Jo Chidley:
Yeah, it's good. We are starting to get some more light in the morning and light in the evening, so that really helps with everybody's mood. Spring is just around the corner, so it's a nice day here today.

Jennifer Norman:
Oh, beautiful. And so tell me about where you grew up and how it was living in Scotland.

Jo Chidley:
Yeah, so I'm originally from Glasgow, which is one of the biggest cities in the UK and the biggest city in Scotland. Working class background. My mum was a nurse. My dad was a plumber. And we then moved out to a little town, which is where beauty kitchen is based now, which is called Wishaw, which is about 30 minutes south of Glasgow.

Jo Chidley:
And I think, really, from those very traditional roots, there wasn't such a thing as waste. We didn't waste the basics like milk or bread or fruit or veg. Everything had some other use that happened even when it came to its end of life. And I think that kind of followed the path through everything that I did. Not just from the business perspective, but if I think from a fashion perspective, vintage and secondhand fashion has been big here in Scotland for a long time. And a lot of that is down to originally, rather than it being cool and trendy, was more around what disposable income you had. But I think those real traditions that come through, I really dislike the word waste as a scientist, you know, in a chemist in particular, we don't create things. We create things to make it plentiful, but not necessarily to waste.

Jo Chidley:
And really, that's the journey that I've been on in many different ways, even though there's lots of things that I do that are frivolous. I have a passion for shoes, for instance.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah.

Jo Chidley:
So it's not that I live in this...It's not that I live this kind of...People always think of sustainability and being an environmentalist or an activist or a campaigner, they seem to put you in this sort of box where you must live in a hut in the middle of nowhere, that it's not real. But actually, most of the environmentalists and the activists that I know, not just within the B Corp movement, but friends, family, and beyond. Everyone has that little sort of part of the grass, whatever that is for them, whether it's the garden, whether it's their fashion, whether it's their music, whatever it is that they're an expert in, and nobody would like to see waste in that area. And I just think that coming back to the words that you were looking at in terms of healing humankind, what does it mean to be human? And I do believe that a lot of, particularly consumer products, which the beauty industry is, has really destroyed that in touch and feel with value. Everything seems to be disposable.

Jo Chidley:
You know, throw away, use once, don't use again, move on to the next thing. And there's something quite unearthly about that. And as we know, we're kind of paying the price.

Jennifer Norman:
Well, it is really very telling in terms of your journey, and that's just the way that you were living, it's like you just didn't waste things. And I know so many people who had grown up in communities, in towns that were like that. And it becomes a bit of a horrification when you start seeing what has happened. When mass production things don't sell, even if they do sell, it's kind of like the idea of churning and new-new-newness really just creates this nonsensical economy that is built on just creating waste, which is an unfortunate thing. When was it when you first noticed that this was a serious problem? At what point in your career did you say, oh my God, I've got to do something about this?

Jo Chidley:
I think, so, I have worked for large corporate organizations and both that are consumer products businesses, but also tech businesses. And there's something around the aspect of obsolescence that has created this very linear economy that as soon as...and it wasn't, I'm not old enough to say that I was working in the seventies, but it kind of started to happen really in the seventies when I noticed it personally myself, it was probably in the mid to late nineties. So I was in my early twenties. And you just started to see that there was nail bars that were happening and department stores were no longer just the ones that sold premium beauty. It was starting to be available. I think it was that access, where you could start to access.

Jo Chidley:
And then also in the late nineties, you had the rise of the Internet. Now, okay, e commerce was a little bit later, but I think all of these ways where people could access things that before they just couldn't. So I think there's lots of different angles of approach that have happened to create this really wasteful world that we currently live in. And it's when something becomes the norm, it's then desensitized. So people then don't think it's actually a bad thing anymore because it happens everywhere. I think that then becomes in the human consciousness. And it's almost a bit like, I'm a big reader. I love science fiction in particular.

Jo Chidley:
If you've ever seen the science fiction movie The Matrix, where you're kind of just plugged into something and it's, the world has been created around you and until you really drag yourself out of it, you don't see it for what it really is. And it's a real shock. Now, I know that's an exaggeration in terms of The Matrix, but just to give people that is that kind of viewpoint that we go about our daily lives and we buy things, and it's these very small things that we do that were now 8 billion, soon to be 11 billion people. That that is huge, you know, whereas 50 years ago, it just wasn't there.

Jennifer Norman:
It's true. I will tell you that one of my first instances of seeing something that was so egregious was, I was working for a large beauty company. It was the first large beauty company in my career that I had worked for out of business school. And at the time, I was working on their lip products. I was an assistant or an associate on their lip products. And at the time, I remember the marketing manager, product development, we were getting ready to launch this massive new line. It would have had multimillions of dollars of advertising against it. Packaging was done, getting ready to get it out into retail.

Jennifer Norman:
Then the corporate boohahs come, and theyre coming to approve all of the products and make sure that theyre aligned with what were doing. And when the marketing manager presented the lipstick to him, he said, I hate that case. I absolutely hate that case. You are not launching that case. And they had already molded and produced millions of lipstick cases, and so what did they do? They scrapped it all. That was almost like one of my very first introductions into beauty. And I thought to myself, oh, okay, that's the way that it is. Wow.

Jennifer Norman:
To me, it was surprising just being new in the industry, but it's almost like it didn't really dawn on me until later years. It's like, oh, my God, that's just going into, like, there's no way to recycle that. There is no way. Or at least at that point, it wasn't even thought about. It was just like, it would have been a blip if there was a typo on a package or if there was anything wrong that somebody didn't like up in corporate headquarters, it was just like, scrap it. Don't like it. No.

Jennifer Norman:
And very little thought to what that was doing. I also worked for a large company that was very big in microbead exfoliants, and we...and no one thinks to bat an eye and say, like, well, what is that going to do once it washes down the drain and gets into the water? And what's it going to...Nobody thought about that. And now it's, Maya Angelou is brilliant for saying, we do until we know better, and then when we know better, we must do better. We do better. And if we don't, then shame on us.

Jo Chidley:
Yeah, I agree. And it's always that question of, where does it go? So as long as you're thinking that as soon as you've started that journey of asking everything, where does it go? You know, you look around and you see everything that is not just part of your life, but part of everyone that you come into contact's life that is derived from fossil fuel feedstocks. And we know not to. This is not a conspiracy theory. This is based on scientific research. That industry knew that the renewable sector was going to grow and that they would have to find other ways of being able to use their feedstocks. And the best way for them to do it was through chemical organizations. And that's what's happened.

Jo Chidley:
So if I give examples of gelatin, for example, so the laundry capsules, originally, the fabric conditioners, the scent would be encapsulated in a vegetable based gelatin. And that was actually P&G that invented that. I mean, was superb. And then they stopped using it because of encapsulating it in plastic, because it was cheaper, because, well, it was cheaper. And who knows what other monetary budgets were happening in other places. But that's where business, and that's the whole passion for me in terms of certification and B Corp, because at the end of the day, business has been allowed to go rogue. Because if it can make something that it can sell, there's very little legislation, or generally speaking, the legislation takes a long time to catch up. By that time, an industry has already risen and can then lobby.

Jo Chidley:
When that's the cycle that happens. And we are right in that moment just now, when we think about AI now, whatever people's opinions are on AI, whether it's positive or negative, I think everyone recognizes that, that it's moved so quickly as an industry and the legislation is so far behind, there's a lot more people sitting up and listening. However, that has happened in lots of other instances with other industries like the fossil fuel industry. Whereas with B Corp, that is giving you not just a framework to say you can have a commercial organization, but you have to live to these different standards and questions almost every part of your business, where does it go? And that's the question for me, on everything. Where does it go? Because it will always end up in our industry. Generally speaking, if we think in the UK, you have five and a half million businesses, of which 98.5% of them are 250 employees or less, so they're classed as small and medium enterprises. Yeah. Of those businesses, 2000 of them are B Corp certified.

Jo Chidley:
And the reason why I'm saying those stats is just to give people an indication of how many businesses are out there and how niche it is as a business to stand up and use your business beyond profits, as you've said, on a force for good, you know, it's still very fringe, it's still very niche because most businesses can almost do what they want in anything.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah, I almost like to think of B Corps, and certainly there are very good companies that are not B Corp certified. That is not a necessity. However, it's the values that are being held that are helping the economy to be truly healthy for everyone, for all stakeholders, not just the company and its constituents, its own stockholders itself. And that is the difference. And perhaps you probably articulate it a whole lot better than I can, Jo. But in terms of the fact that a lot of companies, they start, people just want to make a living. They want to be able to survive. Okay, that gets to a point.

Jennifer Norman:
But there's somewhere along the way, if there is a strong tendency to chase dollars, to chase growth, and to start growing at any cost, and as they say, profit at any cost. And so that's where dysfunction and unhealthy practices can start taking place. Corners can be cut, things will start happening in terms of management decisions that are not necessarily very beneficial for people or the planet as a whole. And we're playing the long game here. We're talking about like large, long term ways of doing your business. What is going to happen to people if they continue down this path? You can see it in the sugar industry. You can see it in a lot of things that we don't necessarily need, but are addictive. And certainly there has been a whole push, I think, even in the beauty industry early on, to become beauty addicts, frankly, it's like you need to have the latest color, just like fashion, the trends.

Jennifer Norman:
It's like you need to have the latest product or you're not going to be cool. A lot of that was stroking ego. And so it's really causing you to buy a whole lot of stuff that you really don't need. Now, if it brings you joy....and that's another thing, just to the point of Jo buying her shoes. I mean, there is a level of, we all want to live, we all want to just enjoy life. This is not about oppression. This is not about going back and just like stripping yourself of everything and becoming a monk on a hill or anything. Certainly it's like this is really about starting where you're at and then just becoming more conscientious of the choices that you're making and what that total impact, that ripple effect is going to have on everything.

Jennifer Norman:
We talk about the cash register being your ballot box. It's like every time you're voting for a company, if you're giving your money to that company, then you're voting for them to succeed. And so it's good to know...some people don't care and they'd rather stay ignorant. And there is this whole idea of ignorant bliss, but it's like, sometimes it's really good to know where your money is going and what you're supporting. Does it support child labor and slavish practices over in another country that you're not aware of? Is it causing extraction of precious minerals and natural resources that can't be replaced? There are so many things, and Jo has really kind of lifted the veil off of a lot of this and is making it her life's work to help, to really focus on what are we doing to the environment? What are these products? How are they made? How are they built? What are the decisions that go into that? And then, what can we do as companies to build better products, to create a more circular loop when it comes to our economy? And perhaps, Jo, you could explain to us what it means to be cradle to cradle, what it means to be circular, because I'm sure that there are some people listening that are like, okay, I'm leaning in. I want to hear more. I want to know all about what Jo is talking about here.

Jo Chidley:
Yeah. So Cradle to Cradle was a certification. The Cradle to Cradle Institute owns that certification. It started round about similar time to B Corp as well. It was two guys, a German chemical engineer and an American architect, who wrote a book which was called Cradle to Cradle in the early nineties. And they also wrote a follow up book a few years later. But that was where they were taking the lead from nature. Where there is no waste in nature, everything is a resource for something else.

Jo Chidley:
So that concept and that concept of circularity is if we think about nature. So if you think about a bird, for example, yes. So the bird lives, it has a great life, it has children, it gets old, it dies, it falls to the ground, it goes to the soil, and it's then nutrition for something else to grow which another bird could eat. And again, that cycle just goes round. And that is why they are still the perfect hunter gatherers, which is really where human beings started out. We didn't have a house, we didn't have things. We just went about in that way, and we didn't create waste. As soon as we kind of settled and became settlers and traders that trade started to happen.

Jo Chidley:
But what, Cradle to Cradle, we're saying, well, we don't need to stop doing that, but what we just need to think about is when you are designing a product or a service, you have to think about if I take a chair as a great example. So most chairs, the one that I'm sitting on just now, you cannot take apart. Yes. Or repair.

Jennifer Norman:
Yes.

Jo Chidley:
So what happens is, if a leg falls off this chair, it has to go to the bin. So the way that you would design a chair, which there has been, I think it's Herman Miller is the company. They've designed office furniture that can be repaired or it can come back at the end of its life because it's grotty or whatever, back to Herman Miller. They can dismantle it and make it into a new chair. And that was really just because when you look at things, at that kind of detail, you're then looking at is the screw a screw that can come out? Are the handles and the legs replaceable? You're looking at every aspect, rather than just looking at how cheap can we make that chair? But the other interesting thing with cradle to cradle is that you, not only are you designing for the future, but you are then creating products as a service. And that's always been the really difficult thing with the circular economy. So when you look at tech businesses, they have dematerialized everything that they do by offering software as a service. Yeah.

Jo Chidley:
But the challenge when it's a product as a service is that it's a physical asset. And it's like, who then, you know, either owns that asset or how do you get it back for repair? And that's what really interested me about cradle to cradle. So the principles are material utilization, material health, water stewardship, social fairness, and renewable energy. There you go. There's five areas and quite a few of those areas that you can tick off quite easily.

Jo Chidley:
So in Scotland, we're really fortunate. We have high percentage of our electricity as renewable energy. In fact, this year was the first year that Scotland created enough renewable energy that we could have covered all of our energy requirements. The reason why we couldn't is that a lot of our houses are gas, central heating. So you can't use renewable energy. There's always another gate that you have to get through. But when it's Cradle to Cradle, if I take Beauty Kitchen's products. So the first part for Beauty Kitchen's products is the formulation, are the products, is it effective? Is it not? There you go. Yes.

Jo Chidley:
Is it natural? Is it sustainable? And these all interplay with each other. So Jennifer's just showing our Abyssinian Oil Halo product there. And the reason why this is a great product is not only does it work, but abyssinian oil is great from a regenerative perspective, because it can be grown almost anywhere and has a very short harvest time. It does just as well or better than some of the other exotic oils that we use in our products, like argan oil, which comes from a very small part of Morocco, for example. So the sustainability and the regenerative aspect is there in each of the formulations. And Cradle to Cradle check all of that to the molecular detail.

Jo Chidley:
But then you've got the packaging.

Jennifer Norman:
Yes.

Jo Chidley:
So the formulation, big tick, it does lots of things from a circularity perspective, but when it comes to packaging, it's this physical asset. And really, the packaging, although it can be aesthetically great for your brand, and I get that generally, it doesn't get recycled. It goes in the bin, and it's just not circular. It doesn't have that circularity aspect. And that was where, for Beauty Kitchen, we had developed some great formulations. But what I wasn't happy with was the circularity, or the Cradle to Cradle aspect of our packaging. And that was where our new business was born, which is Reposit.

Jo Chidley:
And that was creating a packaging as a service offering, not just for Beauty Kitchen. It solved a problem for us, but also for other businesses. So we currently work with Marks & Spencers, Weleda, Neil Giard (sp), Unilever, as an example, where they utilize our packaging as a service. And that's all based on not just Cradle to Cradle principles, but B Corp principles as well. And for me, those two certifications together have so many multi attributes to them that we're covering a lot of ground. Now, any certification, like any person or any business, it doesn't do everything 100% perfect. But then, if it did, we wouldn't then have problems to solve, and what would we do?

Jennifer Norman:
So, I want you to say a little bit more about Reposit. You're saying that you're working with retailers as well as other companies in order to make products as a service. What does that mean?

Jo Chidley:
So, Reposit. If we look at our industry, everyone recognizes the 250 ML Boston round, which a lot of companies use for body wash, shower gel, shampoo. So, this is the single use plastic version. This is a 250 ML Boston round returnable version. And what that means is that each piece of packaging has a QR code which identifies this piece of packaging. It tells me a plethora of information. When the product was made, when it was filled, when it was sent to the retailer, when it was sold, when the customer returned the empty. So what happens is I take this body wash, I use it at home, I then return my empty to store or through other means to get it back.

Jo Chidley:
So whether that's a postal service, and it then goes through Cradle to Cradle, standard cleaning protocols. And what I mean by that is we don't need to use any detergent within the cleaning protocols and then the packaging is brand new again. Yeah. So it is the milkman model. It is the way that we used to do things. The difference being is that we're using the technology to leverage the digital asset, but then we're also creating cleaning protocols and return systems to be able to get that packaging alongside a rewards program that any sort of customer can use. So when we're seeing it's packaging as a service, what that means is that the company, whether that's Marks & Spencer's, for example, or Beauty Kitchen, rather than them having to buy this expensive, more expensive than a plastic bottle, they lease this bottle or container for the same price as the plastic container. Yes, they fill it and then we do all of the return logistics, the cleaning, etcetera, as part of that lease fee.

Jo Chidley:
And that means that this bottle stays in circulation again and again and again. So people are asking how many times at the moment we have worked around life cycle analysis in terms of if it's a glass bottle, it needs to be, or a glass jar, something that's made with glass, it has to be returned once for it to have a lower global warming potential than a single use equivalent in plastic. Similarly, when it comes to aluminium, it's three times, because aluminium uses a lot of energy to be made in the first place. However, we have just launched the first 100% recycled aluminium yet, which means, again, it only needs to be returned once for it to have a lower global warming. And then some of the other materials that we use are stainless steel. We are working behind the scenes on washable plastics, but what we wanted to do was there is already materials that are out there that are going into. And I'm doing it in these quotes because I don't understand it. They're going into the recycling bin.

Jo Chidley:
They're going into the recycling bin. So things like glass and aluminium, they don't need to be recycled. They can be returned, washed to be, then, you know, used again. So you're actually then taking it out of the recycling loop, which already has its problems with, in terms of if it's been contaminated or depending on which county you live in. You know, sometimes they recycle it, sometimes they don't. We're taking it out of that recycling loop and having it as a returnable loop. And that's what the packaging is, a service. The cost of goods is the same for the business.

Jo Chidley:
The customer has to pay a deposit, but that is to ensure the empty is returned and they get that deposit back. So it's just moving through the system. And already we have saved, I think it's somewhere in the region of three and a half million single use containers of different sorts, whether that's bottles, jars, whatever. And we are only at the moment, if we think of the product lines, we're only currently working with a handful of retailers and brands. So we already know that the packaging industry is a $1 trillion annual industry. 99% of that is single use and 98% of that is down cycled. Every year. There's an opportunity for packaging companies to be able to change their business model from a linear, let's sell more and sell it cheap, into a more circular model where the service is then offered because of the returnability.

Jennifer Norman:
Well, I have to commend you for taking on such an important part of the stream. This is one thing where I know that it's hard for people to change behavior, and that's always a little bit of a hurdle as far as like, okay, bring it back and then get something new. But I think little by little, people are becoming much more attuned. Like, just like bringing your own bag to the grocery store. That was a hard thing for a lot of people. And now it's just natural. You bring your own bag.

Jo Chidley:
Of course you do.

Jennifer Norman:
You don't want to have to waste all that plastic again, single use, where you're just bringing it home and probably going to toss it in the trash again. And here we are looking at other opportunities to try to minimize our plastic footprint, as it were. I think that there are some people that would probably ask you, well, aluminum, dense, stainless steel, condensed. And the reason why we're moving away from glass so much is because it's heavy and shipping and it can break and crack and, you know, smash in the back and such. And so what happens when a part of that happens in, even with reposit, like, what happens if you get back dented products and whatnot? Yeah.

Jo Chidley:
So we've gone through a whole process of looking at the differences between what type of product can go into what type of container. Is glass more suitable? Well, glass is obviously more suitable for skincare and smaller volumes, whereas aluminium is for larger. Stainless steel is an option. Which is better for home care and laundry.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah.

Jo Chidley:
So it depends on the category. But I think what we've got to keep in mind is that the plastic industry has had over 120 years of empirical efficiencies and effectiveness to get it to being super cheap. But it's not really super cheap. It's only super cheap if you look through it in a monetary lens. Yeah, because if we actually added up all of. And that's the reason for many countries and regions bringing in things like a plastic tax or a carbon tax, because they're having to do the other side of what's the cleanup aspect of it. So I think we need to be truthful and mindful that when we're talking about returnables, it will not be that we switch off one and switch on the other. It will need to be a transfer of what does work.

Jo Chidley:
And when that happens, then innovation will be driving the changes. So, for example, we work with the largest aluminium packaging manufacturer in the world, and they had never been asked the question yet until we asked it. The question was, how do you make the aluminium container more durable, heavy and more expensive? Because all they've ever been asked is how can you make it lighter, more for single use and cheaper? And that's the thing. So the innovation hasn't gone into, you know, making this where it won't get dented. Yeah, I think it's this being honest, which is what we have with the brands and retailers that we're working with. We also work very closely with other partners and organizations that are in the returnable space. So if we look at the loot program, which is part of Terracycle, which is out from the US, through to Jean Boutet, which is a specialist that's based in France, you know, through to El Gramo, that's a Chilean founded startup as well. So we do try and share information in a collaborative sense, in a non competitive space.

Jo Chidley:
Because when I see the $1 trillion annual industry that's predominantly plastic, that is what our niche little gang of returnables is trying to challenge. So we have to make sure that we do that in a very collaborative way. And I think that's the difference here. A lot of the times with take back schemes, and I bang this drum all the time, but a lot of take back schemes are only for the one retailer or they're only for the one brand. And we just don't live our life that way. If I look at my bathroom cabinet, it's not all beauty kitchen yet. I have different brands that have come from different retailers. And that's what we've done with reposit.

Jo Chidley:
We want to make it accessible. It doesn't matter where you are on your journey as an organization or as a customer, an end user, that you should be able to return it anywhere. It doesn't matter, because if we do things in isolation and we don't collaborate, we'll just create more waste. Makes sense.

Jennifer Norman:
Exactly. I think that the more that we start seeing responsible companies stepping up and getting onto the shelves and into the consumer, consumer consciousness, then more and more people will start making better decisions for their lifestyle.

Jo Chidley:
Jennifer, honestly, that's the thing. A lot of the larger organizations in particular will see and smaller. We're all in this or the consumer won't change. I don't believe that. I believe that they don't have access to good choices. That's what the challenge is.

Jennifer Norman:
You are so right, because I was thinking about, I know that in Europe, particularly Germany and the UK, I mean, you guys are so much more advanced when it comes to quote unquote, greening. And I'm saying that in air quotes because I think that in the US, some people know what that means, and then there's all sorts of controversy around that term, but really just conscientious about end of life in terms of product. And here in the United States, the Pac Northwest, Oregon, Washington state, there are definite pockets of places which, in terms of the cities, the way that they're really enhancing bicycling or how to recycle, making sure that if it gets recycled, it really gets recycled, rather than going directly back into the waste stream. However, if you're in the middle of the country and there's nothing but Walmart's or there's no healthy choices, there's no way to recycle. There is no such thing as a blue bin or another bin that you can actually do recycling yourself. It becomes harder, it becomes virtually impossible to make good consumer choices when it comes to environmental sustainability. So it really is beholden upon the companies to really do that thinking and to have that level of conscientiousness so that consumers will be able to do the right thing en masse.

Jennifer Norman:
It becomes extremely, extremely important. And I wanted to give a shout out to a couple of companies. For example, you mentioned Terracycle. My company, Humanist Beauty, does do a take back program and invites everybody to send their products for free. My company sends a shipping label to you so that you can package up any empty that's in your bathroom. You can send all of your beauty products packaging back to us and we will send it to Terracycle to be responsibly recycled. I also want to give a shout out to Credo Beauty, the retailer who is doing wonderful, wonderful things when it comes to sustainable practices. They also were the first to start a petition to Stop Single Use Plastic.

Jennifer Norman:
And my company also was a signer of that petition. We absolutely vow that we will never sell a single use product, so that it's just not even a given. So as a consumer, some things that you can take away. If you go into a store and you see a single use sheet mask, do not buy it. Do not buy that sheet mask. Do not buy anything where it's just you use it once and throw it away. The economy is getting so much better about single use straws. Now we're using at least paper.

Jennifer Norman:
They're not great, or you don't have to use any at all. What would it hurt for you to just take a sip out of a cup? It's really not all that deep. It's not that hard to take a sip out of a cup without a straw. So try not to do that. A lot of people are bringing their own implements, their forks and their knives and spoons instead of going and grabbing those ones that are given. If you're actually getting takeout, or tell them, do not put this in my bag. I do not want it. I do not want your forks. I do not want your knives. I do not want your space. Because the less that we buy it, the less that they'll make it. Yep.

Jo Chidley:
Without a doubt.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah. Are there other suggestions, Jo, that you often will tell consumers about behaviors, things that they don't even really think about, that might be helpful for them to just be a little bit more sustainable wherever they're at?

Jo Chidley:
For me, it's about access and inclusivity. It doesn't matter where you are on your sustainability journey. If I asked 100 people, do you want to be more sustainable? Every single person would say yes. But what happens is it's then how do they make that into action? And what tends to happen is, I think somebody did a quote where we do not need thousand people doing sustainability perfectly, we need a hundred thousand people doing imperfectly. And that's just what it is. It's the smaller things.

Jo Chidley:
It's like when you go to a restaurant. Ask for a doggy bag, which I think is horrible, saying doggy bag, but if you have pasta that's left or pizza that's left. Ask them to take it home.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah.

Jo Chidley:
It can be something as basic as that. When you notice anything that if you were in your own house, you wouldn't put it in the bin, then don't let someone else put it in the bin for you. Just ask to take it. Because if I think of restaurants in particular, that's the biggest. That is one of the biggest wastes and the biggest impacts on the planet. Because generally speaking, in the western world and in the north, it happens on a very regular basis and generally it's bigger portions than you can normally eat. Always take the leftovers and get them in your fridge and use them the next day. It then saves you the next day for lunch, for the children or whoever as well.

Jo Chidley:
So you're getting it in both sides. And then the other aspect I see is thinking about renewable energy. If there's any way that you can have a renewable tariff or whether it's a solar powered for your phone, where especially if you live in a much warmer place than Scotland, you can have access to these things, because those things are relatively straightforward to do. They don't cost a lot, they generally save you money. But it also then simpler way for you to turn that. I would be more sustainable into action.

Jo Chidley:
Because we're all in situations where you're at the supermarket, you've got hungry children, they want an apple. The apple is in a plastic bag. I'm buying the apple in the plastic bag. I'm sorry, everyone has those, whatever those are. But you know where your limits are. And through experience, you then it's building up that resilience of having the cup without the straw. Is it too much? Things like that. But the restaurant one I see all the time when we are out, we always ask for the takeaway. And I think as well, because of the COVID backdrop, nearly every restaurant went to takeouts.

Jo Chidley:
So everyone has the takeaway containers. We bring ours with us now, we didn't used to at the beginning, and then we ended up with loads of them in the house. So we now take ours with us. But the children love it the following day because they then get well.

Jennifer Norman:
Jo, I think it's really refreshing for all of this coming from you, because, I mean, as passionate as you are about circularity, as passionate you are as you are about environmentalism, I mean, we all recognize that we're human and there really isn't any...we're not judging anybody for their lifestyles and whatnot. Sometimes you just got to live, you got to buy the shoes. We get that, and it's okay, what joy brings you joy. And I think that's a lot of rhetoric around like, being woke is like, oh, we're all about suffering and pain and making life miserable and we're angry at everything. And it's really about like just these little small choices that we can make that help because collective action, if a hundred thousand, if a million people decide, you know, that straw, it's huge, you know, it's not like you have to do it every single time, but it's like that, it really makes impact. And so maybe you can think after you listen to this podcast, is there something in your life that you could be like, okay, I'm not going to buy that single use such anymore.

Jennifer Norman:
If 99% of packaging is single use and I'm buying it and it looks like it's just gonna all that stuff that the wrapper and everything is just gonna go straight into the trash bin.

Jo Chidley:
Why do it?

Jennifer Norman:
Why not buy something where you can get at least a few uses out of it and then save yourself a few bits of waste that are gonna go into the waste stream? And also, if you're in the UK, Reposit is that beyond the UK, Jo?

Jo Chidley:
Not at the moment, it's. But we will be moving into other regions very quickly in 2025. It just depends. It's that finding the balance in terms of retailer, because for us it's not just one retailer or one brand, it is around this collaborative is definitely collective action and motion. And we had some sticky conversations with some really large conglomerate organizations that have asked us to do this service exclusive. And we've had to diplomatically say, you know, no, because that's not the right thing. It just isn't. This is about inclusivity, this is about working together to overcome and it's about thoughtful disruption.

Jo Chidley:
So for me, although challenger brands or challenger circular business models, they don't need to make another business model obsolete instantly. You can work. If I think of the recycling industry as an example, we're working very closely with them because they are the organizations that have been picking up the trash and sorting it, collecting it and getting it out would they would prefer to have returnables because it generally is cleaner, it's higher value. So it's about working with those industries in a thoughtful way to get everybody involved and also the plastics industry. So it's not that we are just working in this particular area and ignoring or trying to disengage with a certain aspect of the industry, because everyone in the industry has that experience. They have the knowledge. What we bring is a very collaborative approach. And this is about working together in a non competitive environment space to do the right thing.

Jo Chidley:
And that takes a wee bit of a, because most people are like, how do we do that? Because we've never done that before. Everything is like, secretive, and this is my space, and, and that's yours because you're a competitor. That's a different way of working, which has been interesting as well.

Jennifer Norman:
Yeah, and we could have a whole other podcast on that. And Jo and I do believe that collaboration always wins over competition. Competition does create scarcity. It creates rife and animosity. But when you collaborate to build better choices, better decisions, better products, better ways of doing things, then the whole world benefits from that. And so it's not just a lesson for a lot of corporate leaders and marketers and salespeople. It's really a lesson for us all. And I think that more and more, the younger generations get it. Excellent.

Jennifer Norman:
Well, I want everybody to really go right now and look up Beauty Kitchen because Jo has created some beautiful magic with her, not only her ingredients and her formulas, but in the whole ethos of this particular line, it's truly, truly lovely. You can tell that she puts her heart and her soul into it, all of her passion. And you will be supporting a business that is truly beautiful, as well as a beautiful woman who is at the helm.Jo, I want to thank you so much for being on The Human Beauty Movement Podcast today. It was just such a treat to chat with you again.

Jo Chidley:
Thank you for having me. I absolutely loved it. And we could get to spend a little bit more time together on our own for a change. Yes.

Jennifer Norman:
Yes, that's true. Have a great one.

Jo Chidley:
Thanks.

Jennifer Norman:
Thank you for listening to The Human Beauty Movement Podcast. Be sure to follow, rate, and review us wherever you stream podcasts. The Human Beauty Movement is a community-based platform that cultivates the the beauty of humankind. Check out our workshops, find us onsSocial media, and share our inspiration with all the beautiful humans in your life. Learn more at thehumanbeautymovement.com. Thank you so much for being a beautiful human.