Anna Wernicks interview with a zero-waste business, FAIR-WELL...
Image source: https://www.fair-well.co.uk/
If you live in North West London, you may have noticed FAIR-WELL's retro milk float, Charlie, driving around your neighbourhood. Charlie is akin to Mary Poppin's bag, or Dr Who's Tardis, in that he can fit an impossible number of items on board. What's more amazing is that all of these items are zero-waste, including everything from washing-up liquid to fusilli. My personal favourites are the coconut flakes and community muesli – they make for a delicious breakfast.x
FAIR-WELL is perfect for those of us who are trying to reduce their single-use plastic in the home, and what's more ideal is that they deliver! So, there is no need to lug your heavy jars to the local health food shop. Once your slot is confirmed, all you have to do is leave your containers on your doorstep with a note of what product you'd like and how much, and they do all of the work for you.
If a zero-waste business wasn't enough, FAIR-WELL is also women-run – by the incredible Jerilee and Claire. I spoke to the pair about their reasons for starting the company:
'We set up FAIR-WELL to make it easy for people to access plastic-free and truly conscious shopping. We wanted to remove all obstacles and barriers to making the change to packaging-free shopping. We understand how hard it is to change such an ingrained habit, so we are working to make this as easy a change as possible. This is why the delivery was so important for us.
FAIR-WELL is not in the business of selling food, it is in the business of changing habits and this is a completely different focus and where our focus is.'
At the heart of FAIR-WELL's ethos is that for true change we don't need a few people being perfect, we need lots of people being imperfect. They are realistic in their own attitudes towards being eco-friendly, as well as other peoples.
'In order to bring true change, we all have to support each other and to do this there has to be no judgement of where we are at in our plastic free journey. We like to focus on encouraging people to think about their actions and to slowly start when and where they want. It's a hard change and we know it, that's why we want to be there as a friendly, fun and encouraging help.'
Finally, I asked the team what they envisioned the future of plastic would be.
'We cannot expect a life without plastic because plastic is not entirely bad. It [has] actually saved so many lives in hospitals since it has been created. It is maybe one of the greatest inventions if you look at all the different uses of plastic. I think the answer is more how do we use it, what for, how can we regulate the production of it, or can we just stop it and use what's already here, how can we recycle it efficiently and so we don't see it killing our oceans and polluting our air.'
The pair have now diverted thousands of single-use packaging away from landfill, as well as built a strong sense of community to the local area. If you are local to Hampstead, Kentish Town, Tufnell Park, Dartmouth Park, Holloway or Archway, and you'd like to reduce your plastic waste, then I can't recommend FAIR-WELL enough!
Check out their website: https://www.fair-well.co.uk/
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Anna is the UCL Climate Action Society's Welfare Officer.
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