Slim Your Bin

Where to start??

We’re so often asked, I want to go zero waste/ plastic-free / reduce my rubbish, but where do I start?

Sorry but there’s no zero waste one-size-fits-all response, other than to say, anywhere! Even by asking the question you’ve already begun your journey towards plastic-free/ zero-waste/ carbon auditing — or as we call it, Lower Impact Living.

Something we’ve found really useful was a waste-audit, and so we’re sharing ours with you below.

(Please email hello@dolilthings.org if you can’t download the images, we’ll send a PDF)

Do this waste audit - for ideally, a week - and you’ll have a list of the worst offenders in your lifestyle, and in order of priority. Then you can either choose to tackle it room by room, or by worst offenders. For me, it was realising that we didn’t need to buy THAT many sparkling water bottles and a second-hand sodastream cut our waste by an embarrassingly large chunk!

So let’s get started…

TAKE STOCK - pop the audit or even just a piece of paper by the bins in your house. Ask household members to join in, and to list their waste when they pop it in the bin/ recycling. For some recurring items, it might be easier to use a tally.

ACT NORMALLY - try to use items as you normally would. While even taking note of what we do will change our behaviour in some ways, it's more useful if it's a normal week.

DON'T BEAT YOURSELF UP - we are aiming for consistency, not perfection. Conducting a waste audit is the first step in identifying the waste that can be cut. There will inevitably be some items that we just have to have. We can maybe come back to these later - or maybe they're just essential. That's OK too.

WHEN DO I DO IT? Probably doing it over the course of a week is best.

WHAT'S NEXT? Simply by looking at the waste collected, you've probably already got great ideas on how to reduce them. And if not, you’re in the right place. If there’s no answer on the Lil blog, email us hello@dolilthings.org