MALE SPEAKER: Thanks everybody for coming to this Google
Author Series talk.
I want to have the esteemed privilege
to introduce Bea Johnson, author of "Zero Waste Home."
Bea, she's lived a waste-free lifestyle since 2008,
generating for her whole family just a quart
of waste in an entire year.
She's also zero waste lifestyle expert.
Her goals shatter the misconceptions
associated with living in zero-waste lifestyle proving
that a waste-free living can not only be stylish but lead
to significant health benefits and time and money savings.
She was a grand prize winner of the green awards.
She's invited to speak, like here, at many corporate events,
universities, and other conferences all over the world.
And she spreads her tips for living a zero-waste lifestyle
in that.
She opens her home to educational tours
and the media.
I know [? Myomi ?] has been to her house,
has been shopping with her at Whole Foods to see how she does
this.
She's appeared on TV shows and publications around the world,
including the "Today Show" and the "BBC Breakfast."
New York Times has called her the priestess
of waste-free living.
I like that one.
As a spokesperson for a zero-waste lifestyle,
she also provides consulting services
for sustainable product conception, waste reduction,
and minimalism.
Welcome Bea.
[APPLAUSE]
BEA JOHNSON: Thanks so much for having me.
It's so funny that I have been calling myself a Google girl,
and here I am today at Google.
So first, let me introduce my family.
And so this is my family.
On the right, we have Max who's now 15,
Leo, on the left, who is now 14, my husband, Scott,
and our zero-waste dog, Zizu, is actually the mascot
of our zero-waste lifestyle.
So yeah, it's the little baby of the family.
Anyways, our zero-waste journey started back in 2006.
We were living back then in a large home, 3,000 square feet
in the suburbs in the East Bay actually in Pleasant Hill.
But that house was located in a cul-de-sac.
And the problem with that is that we felt that we
had to drive everywhere.
We had to take the car to go to the grocery
store, the schools, church, and movie theaters, and so on.
So we decided that we wanted to relocate to a location
where we could have these things within walking distance
or biking distance.
So we chose the town of Mill Valley.
But before finding the ideal home,
we rented an apartment for a year.
And we only moved in with the necessities.
So instead of moving in with fork tables and 26 chairs,
we only moved in with one table, four chairs, one set of dishes,
one set of towels, et cetera.
And what we found during that year
is that by living with less, all of a sudden,
we had more time in our hands to do the things that we enjoy
doing, more time to spend with family and friends, more time
to explore a new coast or region.
So when we did find the ideal home in downtown Mill Valley,
we got everything out of storage.
And we realized that a lot of the things that we
had kept in there for a year are totally gone and missed.
We realized that there were a bunch of things in there
that we hadn't even needed or even missed.
And so we got everything out of storage
and questioned ourselves about all the stuff
we had, and we let go of about 80% of our belongings.
And then thanks to that voluntary simplicity,
that also opened more time to educate ourselves
on environmental issues.
So this was back in 2007.
We read some books.
We watched some documentaries.
And what we discovered with my husband really
made us sad thinking about the future
that we are going to leave behind for our kids.
So we decided to do something about it.
So my husband quit his job to start a sustainability
consulting company.
And I tackled the home.
So I got super motivated at first.
And there is lots of things that I tried.
I googled a lot of alternatives.
And some of the things that we discovered we still
do today such as canning.
This is actually canning season.
I have how-to's on my blog.
So on Saturday, I'll be buying a bunch of flats--
I mean a flat of tomatoes.
And then I'll be canning it for the year.
It's not like I can all year long, or all day.
I just can once a year for the rest of the year.
But anyways, some other alternatives that we tried
did not quite work out for us.
So I had heard about the [INAUDIBLE]
option of shampooing your hair.
And so I thought, oh maybe that will be
a good alternative to shampoo.
And so what that involves is using
baking soda in lieu of shampoo.
You're supposed to wet your hair,
sprinkle baking soda on your scalp, you massage it in,
and then you rinse with apple cider vinegar.
Now after six months, the oils of my hair
had migrated down to here, and I ended up with frizzy ends.
Not really the look I was looking for.
And when I went to lay down next to my husband
after those six months, he looked at me and he said,
I am just so tired of you smelling like vinaigrette, Bea.
It's really not sexy.
So I thought, yeah, maybe he has a point there.
I need to find another alternative.
And I did.
It's not shampoo.
I'll mention it later.
But I picked another alternative.
I also came to look at my cosmetic pouch at one point.
And I wanted a greener alternative, or at least
a zero-waste alternative for all the items that I had in there.
So I took my cosmetic pouch to a green pharmacy.
And I asked the sales person to give me
an alternative or a product for all the things I had in there.
She said, I have a mascara for you.
I have different types of makeup for you.
But I don't have an alternative for a lip plumper.
So for the guys that are here that don't know what
a lip plumper is, it's a glass that
has an ingredient in it that's supposed
to make your lips bigger.
Doesn't make it bigger.
I've actually taken a ruler and measured the before and after.
It doesn't really make them bigger,
but it makes you feel like they are bigger.
So since she didn't have an alternative for me, of course,
I googled it.
Alternative to or green way to make your lips bigger.
And I found this video of this beautiful woman
on YouTube, a woman that had lips a bit like Angelina Jolie,
like really nice and [INAUDIBLE].
And I thought, well, perfect.
That's what I need.
And she said, it's very simple.
All you need to do is gather some stinging nettle,
you remove the leaves, and then you roll the twig on your lips.
And I thought, uh, how simple that is.
I have a bunch of stinging nettle in my backyard.
So I put on some gloves, and I hiked up my hill
because we're on a hill.
And I grabbed a bunch of stinging nettle, brought it
back down to my kitchen, I removed the leaves carefully,
and then I rolled the twig on my lips.
OMG, did it hurt!
Of course, it did not at all provide
the results I was expecting.
And not like the video, I ended up with blotches, red bumps all
over the place.
Not very sexy, or not very much the look
I was looking for again.
And of course, that's when my husband came home from work.
And he looked at me, and said, oh my gosh.
What did you do again, Bea?
And I said, eh, just trying out something.
Don't worry about it.
We also came to question our use for toilet paper.
So at that point I was taking a foraging class.
And once we were in the forest.
And my teacher said, well, if you guys are ever
stuck in the woods with no toilet paper, that
moss out there is awesome.
I thought there Is my alternative to toilet paper.
So I grabbed some and took it home, but-- but moss, FYI,
it dries over time.
So the first day it might be soft,
but the next day, you're basically
left with a scouring pad.
Not very pleasant.
So we decided to forego that idea.
And instead, we decided to stick to toilet paper.
It's 100% recycled.
We buy it from a restaurants and hotel supply store
because we can buy it wrapped in paper.
We don't have to worry about the plastic packaging.
So after all this trial and error, we found balance.
And we found that for zero-waste to be truly
sustainable in our home, we simply
had to follow five rules in order.
It was all of it simply about refusing, reducing, reusing,
recycling, and rotting in order so
that at the end of the year-- sorry
I disappeared there-- we're left with one jar of waste.
So this basically represents our family's waste for the year.
This one is 2014.
So the first rule then that we apply is we simply refuse.
We simply say no to the things that we do not need.
We say no to single-use plastics--
plastic bags, water bottles.
But we also say no to freebies.
For today, in this consumerist society,
we're the target of many marketing goods.
But every time we accept them, it's
a way for us to reinforce an unsustainable practice.
Every time we take a free plastic pen from a conference
that we do not need-- because I think
everyone has enough pens in their homes
to last them a lifetime-- every time
we accept one of those pens, then
more oil will be drilled from the ground
to create a replacement.
Same goes with junk mail, every time
we take junk mail straight from the mailbox
and put it in a recycling bin, it's a way for us to say,
love junk mail.
Please send me more.
And more will be sent out to us.
So it's important to say no to these things
to simply stop the demand.
We also say no to business cards.
So don't try to give me your business card later.
I'll have my contact info at the end of the presentation.
Our second rule is to reduce.
So I'm sorry the slide is so light.
So we reduce what we do need.
So that means for us living a minimalist lifestyle.
So in our kitchen, for example, as you can see
the counters are pretty bare.
But I love it that way.
It's actually much easier to clean-- much faster to clean.
I used to have next to my stove a jar filled with accessories
and different types of spoons until I realized that I only
have two hands.
I only use one spoon at a time.
I don't need the 10 of the same spoon.
So today I've downsized to the true accessories that I need.
Same goes for underneath my sink.
Underneath my sink in the old days
was filled with products-- toxic products-- products
that the marketers told me I needed
for different applications.
They tell us that to clean the floor we need a product,
to clean a window is a different product, to clean your bathroom
a different product, the kitchen a different product.
This is all BS.
I found that we can clean the whole house simply
with a spray mixed with water and vinegar.
And we use castile soap also that we purchase in bulk.
In a pump at the sink, we use it to wash our hands,
wash dishes, wash the dog, wash the floor.
This is our bedroom.
Even if it's a total whiteout for you,
we still don't have much in the bedroom.
And we just have what we need in order to sleep in the room.
And this is our closet.
So my husband and I share a closet.
This is not the walk-in closets that you
see in movies or in glossy magazines
because it's not really a walk-in closet.
It's more of a scoot-in closet because it's so tiny.
But my husband has the top rail.
And I have the bottom one.
And then he has one set of shelves.
I have the other.
When we decluttered our lives, we
came to choose [INAUDIBLE] items that
were the most versatile, the most multi-functional.
And in my case, I ended up picking a wardrobe
that I can dress up or down for different events
and throughout the seasons.
Well, likely to live in California,
it's much easier for us to do that.
So in my case, I have one pair of shorts, two skirts-- that's
one of them.
By the way, in drought season, wearing leather
is awesome because you obviously don't throw that in a wash.
You just wipe it off.
Saves water.
I have two dresses, seven shirts, three sweaters,
five pairs of shoes.
Actually, talking about the shoes, at one point,
I looked at my tennis shoe, and I
realized that they were gathering
dust more than anything.
All my activities, my more sporting activities,
do not really require the use of tennis shoes.
So instead, I have a bootie that I
can wear when I go hiking, backpacking, biking.
I don't need a pair of tennis shoes.
This is a little experiment that I did for my blog.
I wanted to show that this one little black dress that I
purchased for $2 at a secondhand store--
because we buy all our wardrobes from a secondhand store--
can create lots of different looks
based on how I accessorize it, whether I dress it up or down,
and wear it under something or on top of something.
My kids are also, of course, minimalists.
This is Leo's bedroom.
And his closet is as bare as ours.
As you'll notice, he doesn't have much clothes.
But all our clothes actually fit in carry-ons.
So what's great about that is when we want to go away
for a weekend, or a week, or a month, all we have to do
is pull our wardrobes in our carry-ons.
We zip them.
We're out the door.
Then we have a service that comes, cleans the house.
And then the renters come and pay for our vacations.
So this is one of those ideas that my husband
had four years ago.
He only has two good ideas a year, and I have to say,
this one blew my mind.
My kids today don't really have toys because they're teenagers.
But when they did have toys, we encouraged them
to pick their favorite items.
And then once they became older, they
were able to sell them to purchase more
age-appropriate replacements.
So this is our bathroom.
As you can see it's also very minimalist.
And what you see on the right is basically
the contents of the medicine cabinet
that you see on the left.
So there again, when we decluttered,
we realized what our essentials were.
So just to give you some examples on what I've done,
for example, for cosmetics, on my skin,
the only thing that I actually buy
manufactured is a tinted moisturizer with an SPF in it.
Otherwise, to hydrate my skin, I buy cooking oil in bulk.
The black that you see on my eyes
is, actually, almonds that I have burnt
and to which I have added a little bit of oil.
My mascara is made of four ingredients, same ingredients
that you can actually eat, that I've purchased
in bulk from the bulk isles.
And actually, I should say, the mascara
is the recipe I'm actually the most proud of in my book.
It took a lot of trial and error to find
just the right concoction.
I went out to dinner once with my girlfriends.
I was trying or testing out a recipe
only to find out once I got home that I had black down to here.
You'd think my girlfriends would tell me, no.
Yeah, I've wiped them out since then-- no, I'm just kidding.
On my cheeks, to add color to my cheeks
and my eyebrows, and sometimes [INAUDIBLE],
I use a cocoa powder.
It's an organic cocoa powder.
And just to fill that little jar, it cost me $0.72.
There is no way I can find an organic bronzer at the store
if I were to buy it manufactured.
And then to smooth out my hair, to add a little shine
on my lips, or maybe highlight my cheeks,
or even add shine on my nails, I make a multi-purpose balm,
which are simply two ingredients-- beeswax
and cooking oil.
All the recipes are in my book, again,
so if you guys are interested in these alternatives,
check it out.
The deodorant, we use a crystal.
As a hair spray, we reduce lemon peels
with a little bit of water, and it's magic.
It works.
It actually makes your hair stick.
I don't use it.
My husband does to make his little hair spiky in the front.
To shave, he uses a double-edged razor.
It's actually a vintage razor that you can
purchase, for example, on eBay.
And then to wash ourselves from head
to toe-- so to wash our hair, our face, or body,
and also to shave, we use a bar of soap
that we buy unpackaged, loose, from the health food store.
Then to brush our teeth, we use baking soda
that we buy loose from the bulk bins.
And then to brush, we use a compostable wooden toothbrush
made out of bamboo.
And this is what we do for floss.
So what we use is simply a little piece of organic silk.
Two strands work better.
So we take them, we twist them, and then we use it for floss.
And then we can compost it.
This is our linen closet.
So you'll tell me, well, great.
But where are the linens?
Well, linens are, actually, once we wash them,
we put them back on the bed.
So we only have one set of linens for each one of us.
In the bathroom, we always have four towels that are hung.
And then we always have four extras in case
we go to the beach, to the pool, or have friends over.
So before basically launching the zero-waste movement
and spending my time preaching the zero-waste lifestyle,
I was actually an artist.
And my previous studio was filled
with art materials-- canvases and frames
and different types of media.
And here I realized that, well, it's
not the materials that make the artist.
It's rather with the creativity that the artist
has in their head that makes the artist.
So I let go, and I donated basically all my supplies.
And I also came to realize that after all my compost
bin and my recycling bin are themselves sources of material.
So the only food that we purchase in packaging
is butter.
So when I came to look one day at my compost bin,
I realized that the butter wrappers, which
we buy-- the wrappers that we pick
are the ones that are made out of the wax paper
because it's compostable.
I decided to make a peace with these wrappers.
So I collected them for four years.
Then I made a lotus flowers, origami style.
And then I applied them to a canvas.
So this basically represents four years of our family's
butter consumption.
Now I know the math people in the room
are good doing this times this equals.
Well, if someone had asked me how much butter
do you think you consume in four years,
I would have guessed 100, maybe 200
to top-- 575 butter wrappers.
OK, I'm French, and I use butter for cooking.
But I also use olive oil.
I had no idea how much we were actually consuming.
The thing is, when we throw things away,
or even when we compost or recycle,
we're completely disconnected with how much we're
truly consuming.
Once you start collecting it for a while,
then you're much more aware of your consumption.
So this to me blew my mind.
This is our garage.
Yet you don't see much in it because there isn't much in it.
I find that in garages the items--
a garage tends to collect the items that are in transit.
The items that we want to return,
the items that we keep for a what-if-- what if we move?
What if our kids move?
What if our kids need this?
What if they want it later?
I know I love the looks over there.
You guys are great.
Yeah, I know what she means.
And what we've done is basically make
a decision on all of these items in transit.
And so today, our garage, it makes it much easier
for us to grab our bikes and go.
After all, that was the reason why
we moved to the downtown of Mill Valley,
so we could have access to our bikes,
so we could bike to things and walk to things.
The third rule is to reuse.
So in our home, reusing means swapping
anything that's disposable for a reusable alternative.
So today we no longer buy boxes of tissues.
We have a glass jar filled with cloth ones.
I have one right here-- just remembered.
We've also been able to eliminate the sponge simply
with a wooden scrubby, a metal scrubby, and rags.
Once the wooden scrubby is no longer usable--
and we usually use them for about two years.
The metal scrubby, I think we've had the same one
for three years now.
And then with rags, you simply can reuse those things
over time, and you don't need to use sponges.
We've also been able to eliminate
aluminum foil, plastic wrap, freezer bags, sandwich baggies,
et cetera-- all those food kind of storage items simply
with glass jars.
And when my kids go to school, they
don't need any fancy lunch gizmo.
What they do is they wrap their lunch, furoshiki-style.
Furoshiki is the Japanese art of wrapping in cloth.
And what's great about doing it this way
is that then the towel becomes your place mat.
It becomes your napkin.
But also you use it for transport.
And everyone has a towel at home.
Everyone can wrap their lunch.
When we have parties of 50 people at our house--
or I should say, more than 10 people because we
can sit 10 at our table.
But if we have more than 10, then we'll make finger foods.
We don't have a lot of stuff at our house.
But what we do have a lot of is glasses
so that if we do have 50 people coming to our house,
we don't need to resort to disposables.
We use a turkey lacers in lieu of toothpicks for the buffet
style food that I put out, and we
have a stack of cloth napkins.
So if you are going to have a party of 50
people at your house and you plan
on serving or having paper napkins, you better at least
have 200 paper napkins because people don't really
respect the paper napkin.
They'll be using at least two, maybe three.
I have found that people respect the cloth way more than they
do the paper napkin.
I only have 32 napkins.
When I have 50 people at my house,
I only need the 32 napkins.
I actually found that only half the people will use napkins.
So for 50 people, 25 napkins is actually enough.
So replacing anything disposable for a reusable alternative
also means shopping with reusables.
So this is the shopping kit that I take with me to the grocery
store.
It's comprised of cloth bags to buy dry goods, mesh bags
to buy produce, glass jars to buy anything
that sweats, such as meat, fish, deli cheese,
grated cheese that I buy at the counter.
I have a pillow case to buy bread.
And I buy a brand of milk that sells in a glass container
that you can return to the store.
And then we can get our egg box refilled
at the farmer's market.
So here I am shopping the bulk foods, the bulk bins.
And then once I am home, then I transfer the dry goods
into glass container.
So this is what a zero-waste pantry looks like.
As you can see, there is no packaging there.
It was great to bag that.
I personally find that it's so much prettier
than a pantry filled with packaging
because you can actually see the food.
What my pantry transpires is not someone's idea
of marketing, of what color should be in someone's pantry.
It's rather the food themselves shine through.
We also purchase liquids in bulk.
I make my own red wine vinegar.
But the only problem with that is that you need red wine,
and at our house, there isn't much left.
This is our refrigerator.
So we actually have refrigerator drawers.
We don't have a refrigerator armoire like the usual kind.
And we found it's actually a great, smart design
to eliminate food waste.
I can proudly say there is no food that's
being wasted at our house.
Because we store all our food in glass containers,
we can see through it.
Because we have refrigerator drawers, we can see on top.
Nothing gets lost in the back of a shelf.
And we make use of what we have.
So before I go to the grocery store, I'll make a list.
I'll make sure to only buy the things that I need.
I'm not buying carrots if I already have carrots.
I'll make sure that I finish them before I buy more.
We also buy beer in a growler from the local Brewery Company.
My local health foods store also has a orange squeezing machine.
So I just bring an old glass milk bottle to refill it.
And then the bottom picture over there is my freezer.
So once I bring 10 baguettes home from the grocery store,
then I cut them in half.
If I don't need half of them because they're
so good and warm.
And then I put them in the freezer
in another pillow case-- no plastic needed.
And then we freeze some of our food in glass containers.
You just have to make sure that it's room temperature
before you put it in.
But the large glass jars that you see,
one actually contains meat bones, another one fish bones,
which we'll then use to make stock.
And then once we've made stock, then we can compost it.
Then we have one for bread slices
that have become whitened by the freezing.
It's basically the freezer burn on bread.
Once the jar is filled with bread,
then we use it to make croutons, or we make bread pudding.
We also use it for bread crumbs.
And we also freeze our candles because candles last longer
if you freeze them.
We also purchase our wining box.
So we have a big stock of lemonade bottles.
What's great about them is that then when we get our wine
refilled, we don't need to have to recourse to corking.
And you can do that in the city at Tank18, or in Half Moon Bay,
there is also La Nebbia that will refill your bottles.
They do that through bottling events.
So for us, reusing not only means swapping anything
disposable for a reusable alternative,
it also means buying second hand when
we do need to buy something.
So like I mentioned earlier, we buy all our clothes
in second hand from the thrift store.
But for certain items that we cannot find in the thrift
store, then we fall back either on the free market--
that's where these patio chairs came from.
Or we fall back on Craigslist.
That's where the table came from.
Or eBay.
And speaking of eBay, it's been great to find the really hard
to find items.
So at the beginning of the school year when the math
teacher requested the scientific calculator,
I fell back on eBay.
When I go on eBay, I make sure to pick the option
on the left-hand side that says second hand
or used or pre-owned sometimes.
Somehow, I think the wording changes, or maybe it's me.
And then once [INAUDIBLE] see all the items
that are second hand.
And then once I've purchased something,
then I request that the seller only
sends it to me in cardboard or paper
because plastic wrap would not fit in my jar.
So the fourth rule is to recycle.
So once you've refused, reduced, and reused as much as you can,
then you have very little to recycle.
This is our chihuahua next to the bin
that we fill once a week.
So today, thanks to our zero-waste lifestyle,
we actually recycle way less than we did before.
For us the zero-waste lifestyle is not about recycling more.
It's about recycling less, thanks to prevention.
So as you saw earlier, we have a chihuahua
so our bin is about this big.
We tried to do zero recycling at one point,
and we found that it was way too constraining
because we had to say no to the bottles of wine
that friends were bringing over.
And that's where I thought I had gone way too far.
And I had to make paper from the school papers that were coming
in from the kids' schools.
It works out a little.
In the summer, the paper dries.
But in the winter-- not only is it time consuming,
but also in the winter, paper doesn't dry so well.
So we also have assigned bins for how to recycle items.
I don't know if you can see what this is,
but this is a bin in which we put all tennis shoes
or sneakers that have a hole in them.
Especially my kids have two pairs of shoes-- flip-flops
and a pair of sneakers.
But when they get a hole in their sneaker,
we throw it in the bin.
Once the bin is full, then we take it
to a shoe store that participates in the Nike
reuse a shoe program.
And Nike then turns them into basketball courts.
There is also a company called-- I think it's Eco or Ico.
I need to ask them how to pronounce their company.
But its I colon CO.
And they have drop-off locations that are really easy to find.
They're in lots of different malls.
What we found with this lifestyle is
that we should avoid plastics at all cost
because not only are they toxic to our health when we use them,
they're also toxic in their manufacturing.
So instead of plastic, we prefer to use-- when we buy an item,
we pick metal because it's recyclable over and over again.
And glass, same thing.
Cardboard and paper is recyclable up to eight times.
And then sometimes, we fall back on wood,
such as the wooden toothbrushes that I showed earlier
because then we're able to compost it.
So composting for us is the last straw before the landfill.
So we compost the rest.
So for us composting has been easy
simply because-- this used to be our trash can.
And it's underneath the counter.
It's out of sight but not out of mind because when
we have something we simply [INAUDIBLE]
choices, recycling or compost.
If our friends have a bubble gum,
we tell them to just swallow it.
No we don't.
That's why I have a couple in there.
But we compost not just fruits and veggies peelings.
As a matter of fact, when we went through a decluttering
process in the kitchen, I came to look at my vegetable peeler.
And I realized that I don't really--
I do use my vegetable peeler, but my mom doesn't have one.
My mom doesn't use one, so then I
thought I probably don't need one.
And I have found that by donating my vegetable peeler,
it's had actually a great impact on how much compost I produce.
I compost way less than I did before.
Because when you have a vegetable peeler,
the vegetable peeler encourages you to peel more than you need.
When you don't have a peeler, you
think twice about peeling anything
because it's more manual labor.
And what's great is that then today we're
composting way less than we did before,
but we're also ingesting all the vitamins
that are enclosed in the fruit and vegetable peels.
We also compost-- well, you can see a butter wrapper in there.
But we also compost the dog nails, the floor sweepings,
hair.
I kept my husband's and my kids' hair so that will go in there.
I don't compost my hair.
I let it grow down to here.
And then once it's long enough, I get it cut.
So I went, I think four months ago.
And then I send the hair to an organization that
makes wigs for cancer patients.
So I actually recycle my hair.
It's the fourth rule, right?
Comes before compost.
Not too long ago, had I heard about a zero-waste family,
I would have thought, oh my gosh.
These people must live in the woods.
I'm sure they are major granola, crunchy people.
Or she's a stay-at-home mom that doesn't
have anything else to do but worry about her waste.
And I'm sure she spends her days homemaking.
Well, that's not me.
I actually am a full-time professional.
And we found that the zero-waste lifestyle is actually not
just good for the environment, but it's also
been great for our health.
Because thanks to the alternatives
that we have adopted, we've been able to eliminate
all the toxic products from our lives.
Like I mentioned earlier, all the things I use for as far
as cosmetics are things that are made from ingredients
that I can eat.
All of my cleaning products are--
I mean it's basically vinegar, water, maybe a little bit
of baking soda, castile soap.
I can totally trust these products.
And so thanks to them, I've eliminated toxics from my life.
We found also that this lifestyle saves a lot of money.
When I embarked on this journey, my husband
was a little worried.
He said, you know, I'm starting this startup
in the midst of the recession.
We cannot afford to be going to the health food store
and the farmer's market.
And so I encouraged them to compare our bank statements
between our zero-waste lifestyle and
our pre-zero-waste lifestyle.
And he found that we were saving 40% on our overall spending.
This is due to the fact that, one, we consume way,
way less than we did before.
Today, we're no longer adding things to our inventory.
We're only replacing what needs to be replaced.
A sneaker has a hole in it or a t-shirt that is too small.
And when we buy the replacement, we
buy it second-hand which by definition is cheaper.
Then we buy our food in bulk.
One needs to know that when you buy food in packaging,
15% of the price covers the cost of the packaging.
So when you buy in bulk, you make an automatic 15% saving.
And finally, we've replaced anything
that's disposable in our house for a reusable alternative.
So that means that we're no longer investing our money
in things that you throw away.
We're no longer investing our money in the landfill.
We're no longer basically throwing our money
out the window.
We've invested our money in things
that we can use over time, reuse over time.
And this has translated in huge cumulative savings.
Actually, those savings have even
allowed us to install solar on our home
which then saves us even more.
The zero-waste lifestyle is a gift that keeps on giving.
But to me, the best advantage of this lifestyle
is the fact that it's turned our life from a life that
was based on things to a life that
is now based on experiences.
Thanks to this lifestyle, we've been
able to have time to do some super cool stuff
like jackhammering my patio, going
[INAUDIBLE] picking for coastal cleanup which
is coming up guys.
It's next week-- or actually at the end of the week.
No seriously.
We've been able to do things as a family
that we never thought possible.
Just in the last year alone, we've
been able to go canoeing in the Everglades, that was right
before my son found himself face to face with a Python.
We rode our bikes from San Francisco to LA.
We've gone ice climbing.
This is one of my favorite pictures.
But actually my favorite picture might be this one.
Did you know how hard it is to get a smile on your teenager's
face.
To me, this represents the zero-waste lifestyle.
This is it.
The zero-waste lifestyle is about living more.
It's about enjoying life.
It's a lifestyle based on experiences instead of things.
Gives me goosebumps every time I say that.
Now I'm not here to tell you guys how to live your life.
I'm only here to share how I live mine.
But if you were interested in living this lifestyle,
my first tip would be to follow the five R's in order.
So refuse what you do not need, reduce what you do need.
Reuse by swapping anything that's disposable
for a reusable alternative and buying second hand when you do
need to buy something, recycling only what you cannot refuse,
reduce, or reuse.
And finally, composting that is rotting the rest.
Of course, my second tip would be to read my book.
I am really proud of my work.
I share everything I know about this lifestyle
in the book about what to do during the holidays, what kind
of gifts to give, what to do when you travel.
But I would also recommend that you download my app, Bulk.
I've created this app to help people
find bulk locations near them.
Whenever I talk about my lifestyle throughout the world,
people tell me, oh, I can't do zero-waste.
We don't have bulk.
Yes you do.
You just don't know.
You just have to find it.
And that's why I created the Bulk app.
The app is populated by the zero-waste community.
So if you guys do know of bulk locations that
are not in the app, please share them with the community.
If you take one thing away from this talk today--
so maybe this should be the top--
but it's that buying is voting.
If you're not happy with the product that you buy,
if you feel that you don't have a choice
and you're forced into buying something, speak up.
Say something.
Send the packaging back to the manufacturer.
Propose alternatives.
Because if you don't say anything, nothing will change.
It's super important that you let your voice be heard.
Back in 2010, I had right in my jar,
right in the front, an insurance card.
Every six months, my insurance company,
which is the largest in the US, would send me a laminated card.
I got tired of it.
I said, you know-- I sent it back to them
with a little note.
I always send a little note saying,
it'd be great if you guys switched your card from being
laminated to a cardboard card.
I mean you can have a thicker cardboard of card,
and at least the card would then be recyclable.
And they did.
They changed it.
And they changed it for all subscribers throughout the US.
I am super happy about that.
I've actually asked people when I give talks around the US,
do you guys have that insurance?
They're like, yep.
Do you have a cardboard card?
Yep.
That's right.
Of course, if you're interested in this lifestyle,
I urge you to join the zero-waste community.
I got to say that, the little au pair that I
was at the age of 18 that came to the US
would have never ever envisioned launching
a movement to the thousands of people
involved in this lifestyle.
Every week I receive an email from an entrepreneur
in like Australia, in Switzerland, in Belgium,
in Quebec telling me, thank you so much for sharing
your lifestyle.
You've inspired me to change my ways,
but you've also inspired me to open a zero-waste store
or start a new zero-waste business.
And this is where you get my info,
and we don't need to exchange business cards.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
MALE SPEAKER: We have some time.
Does anyone have any questions for Bea?
AUDIENCE: I noticed that you've managed
to get rid of your junk mail.
So I've tried to get rid of my junk mail.
I pick up every single thing.
I look on the back.
I'm like, where is the unsubscribe.
If there is no unsubscribe, I pick a random email address
from the company and try to write
them an angry letter saying, stop sending me the dead trees.
But this only gets me so far.
And I don't understand.
I've joined all of these do-not-mail-me lists
and still--
BEA JOHNSON: You're talking about paper mail.
Right?
AUDIENCE: Yes.
Paper mail.
BEA JOHNSON: So I give all the steps in the book
on how to do that.
I can probably say I don't get junk mail anyway.
I should say, the last piece I got,
surprisingly, came from Zero Waste Marin.
That's ironic.
Isn't it?
It drove me crazy.
Like, you guys obviously haven't read my book.
But there are steps that you can take.
I got to say from what I've seen all around the world.
The US is probably the place where it's the hardest
to remove your name from the mailing list
and to eradicate junk mail because it's so
ingrained in capitalism period.
So there are things you can do.
You can even pay a service to do it for you.
There is also, I've been told, about PaperKarma.
It's an app that, I guess, you just
take a picture of the address label,
and they'll take your name off.
But I have found that doing it by myself was fine.
It was not that difficult. You first
sign-- you go to preoptoutscreen.com
or preoptoutscreen.org.
And then there's the other one.
It's dmachoice.org or dmachoice.com.
I can't remember.
I always get those mixed up.
But that's the two places you first need to go.
Take your name off of list.
You basically opt out of those kinds of mailings.
And then I think the hardest is really
to-- you can also go to catalogchoice.org
to get your name off of all the catalogs.
But the hardest one is simply to-- all the letters
that are sent straight to you.
Let's say you've donated money to a charity.
And they are using that to send you letters every month
or whatever, then you have to contact the company directly.
And if you're not happy, then even use social media.
I mean social media has been great about that.
I mean for me it's been great to get my name off
of certain lists.
Or just to make them aware that they are bugging us.
AUDIENCE: How do you keep the wine?
Doesn't that get aerated?
BEA JOHNSON: But the thing is, the one that I buy
is actually getting bottled for the first time.
It's not like-- you're thinking about a bottle of wine that
was bottled and you've drank a little bit of it,
and then you're like, oh, you have all that air.
But when I bring my bottle, it's actually
getting bottled for the first time just as a bottle
that you would buy from the grocery store.
There is a little bit of-- I mean the machine is calibrated
for the 750 ml.
So my bottles are exactly that.
So when it goes through the machine,
it fills just what it needs to be filled.
So you can just keep it as long as you
would a normal bottle of wine.
AUDIENCE: OK, so that container is air tight then.
BEA JOHNSON: Yeah.
So the top, it's a flip-top cap that
is kind of like the flip-top caps they use on beer growlers
so it doesn't let air escape.
AUDIENCE: First of all, thank you.
And so I was looking at your grocery slide.
And you were talking about getting
meat and fish in particular and working with the jars.
Do you encounter any resistance with the packaging on that,
like people at the meat counter?
BEA JOHNSON: Yeah, so the first time
I went to my health food store with my jar, it takes balls.
I got to say, it takes balls to go for the first time.
And you almost cannot tell-- whatever they're going to say,
if they say, no, sorry, can't do it,
don't take no for an answer.
Because, for example, there was a health food
store that I had gone to for-- it was not my main health food
store, but I would go to them like once a month
or so because they had a bulk conditioner that my health food
store didn't have.
But when I was there, I would bring my jar of meat or fish
and have it filled.
It was fine for like three years.
And then one day, I go to the counter.
And the lady behind the counter, I saw her.
I'm like, oh, shoot.
It's a new one.
She said, no, sorry.
Can't do it.
It's against the health and safety regulations.
I'm like, are you kidding me?
You guys have been filling my jar for three years.
No, sorry.
Can't do it.
I'm like, can you please go ask your manager?
Said OK.
She goes asks her manager.
She comes back and says, OK, I can do it.
She fill it.
I come back a month later.
The same lady-- I'm like, oh, boy.
There she is again.
I give her my jar.
She's like, no, sorry.
It's against the health and safety regulations.
I'm like, are you kidding me?
You said the same thing last month.
You checked with your manager and was like, no, sorry.
I can't do it.
It's against the regulations.
I'm like, can you please ask your manager.
She's like, OK.
Asked her manager, came back, OK.
I can do it.
I mean imagine-- it was my first time.
I would have said, oh, no my store doesn't do that.
Forget it.
I'm not doing that.
They don't do it.
Yes they do.
They just don't know they can.
So you just have to find someone that one, will do it, and two,
knows how.
Because there is also-- sometimes
I've gone into stores where they don't really
know how to tear the jar.
So let's say, they'll put a little piece of plastic
on the scale to weigh the meat, and then
they put the meat into the jar.
If it's their first time, that's fine with me.
I'm not going to bother them.
They've generated a piece of plastic.
I'm not taking it home.
It's their problem.
If they didn't know that on their waste,
they would realize that they should learn how to do that.
So I don't let that take me down and make
me feel bad or anything.
But then over time, once you know
which ones know how to work the tear
on the scale and the ones that don't, then
you look for the one that does.
And you ask them to teach the others.
And so at my store now, it's really no issue.
I can go any time.
They know how to do the job.
They know us, and everyone is happy.
AUDIENCE: Great talk.
Thank you.
BEA JOHNSON: Thank you.
AUDIENCE: I have a question on vacation.
I really like the vacation slide you showed.
I just got back from a lovely holiday with my folks
to Florida.
And I noticed Florida's a lot cleaner in terms of litter.
But also every time you stay at a hotel,
they have the same breakfast meals
in this country everywhere.
And there's just plastic containers, you know--
BEA JOHNSON: Yeah.
AUDIENCE: --the plastic forks, the plastic, everything.
BEA JOHNSON: They have a lot of Styrofoam in Florida, I found.
I mean it's kind of a shock when you've lived in California,
and it's been banned, and you just don't see it anymore.
And then you go to another State, you're like, gosh.
I mean don't they realize how bad it is,
and how bad it is for the environment and our health.
So in that case, to me dining is voting,
just like buying is voting.
If you're using those containers,
then you're saying it's OK for them to put them out.
For one thing, if you don't use them,
you're saying that's not OK.
If you contact the company, it's even better,
and you can propose alternatives.
So when we go with our family, we prefer to go to a cafe.
Or there are some chains where we simply just show up
with our cloth bag.
The cloth bags that I show for grocery shopping,
we always have one with us.
I don't have one with me today because I knew I was coming.
I had lunch at Google, and I was set.
She said, don't worry.
It's all reusables.
And amen to that.
It's awesome.
But when I travel, I always have a cloth bag in my bag.
I don't take a whole [INAUDIBLE] dishes and sets.
I know some zero-wasters that do that.
They won't go anywhere without their plate and their utensils.
And I'm like, you know, there is a God out there
that always takes care of me.
And I don't take things for just in case.
There is always, always a solution, really.
If you really truly believe in this lifestyle,
the solutions come to you.
So yeah, I do take my cloth bag, but I don't
take all the dishes and stuff.
So the cloth bag is good for buying
a croissant or whatever dry good that they want to put in there.
If I am at the airport-- so a little
anecdote about the airport.
When I'm at the airport, I found that the easiest
zero-waste snack is a fruit.
And at the airport, they'll sell you apple or banana.
Those are the only two choices.
But then you are stuck with either the peel or the core.
Right?
Some people say, oh, you can eat the core.
There is-- well, whatever.
I've done that sometimes.
I'm not doing that every time especially because the core has
cyanide in it.
But anyways, when I'm left with that, then all I have to do
is find a live plant to dig it in.
The problem is in an airport they don't
have that many live plants.
It's actually really difficult to find a live plant
in the airport.
But I know where they are.
In each of the airports, I know where my live plants are.
In San Francisco, I have my favorite.
And I've seen it grow over the years.
But anyways, you have to also reach to your creativity
to find alternatives.
And to me it's almost become like a game.
So I went-- sorry.
When I get started, I don't stop.
And I have lots of anecdotes.
I went to a green event a couple of years ago.
And back then I remember I would bring a glass with me
in case they were serving in disposables.
And that day, my girlfriend picked me up.
It was really quick.
I didn't even think about bringing my own glass.
But it was a green event, so I thought, I'll be taken care of.
It's green.
I show up, and it was 6:00 PM, wine time.
And they were serving all the cocktails
in those plastic cone bio-based compostable cups.
And I'm like, I'm not using that.
But I looked around in the room, and I
saw that on tables they had little vases, like mason jars,
for their flowers.
I'm like there it is.
So I took someone's used cup, I took a little mason jar.
And went to the bathroom, I did my little dishes,
and I put the flowers into the used cup.
And I washed the mason jar, and then I
went to get my wine that way.
Now someone asked me, well, why didn't you just reuse
or just washed the person's used cup.
I'm like, because then I would have looked like I condone
that practice, that it's OK to be serving-- especially
at a green event, it's OK to be serving bio-based plastic cups.
No.
It's not.
So when I went around with my glass jar,
then it was for me to say, what you're doing is not OK.
This is better.
This is the alternative.
So don't worry about the water because if you
have the creative mind, you'll see solutions everywhere.
AUDIENCE: But it's a compostable cup.
Why would that not be OK-- [INAUDIBLE]?
BEA JOHNSON: OK.
AUDIENCE: Or do you not believe that those cups--
BEA JOHNSON: No.
I do not.
I've actually taken a tour of-- we can say, I think,
that one of the best composting facilities in the country is
San Francisco's.
Right?
Their compostable waste goes to [? Jefferson Prarie ?]
which is near [INAUDIBLE].
And I've gone there.
I was there with a TV crew.
I asked them to get me through there.
We saw the waste get on the conveyor belt.
They have pickers removing those items.
So people that use the green plastic bags for their dog poop
thinking that it's magically going to disappear
in a landfill, no, it doesn't.
And it doesn't compost either.
As a matter of fact, on that conveyor belt,
there are people whose job it is to pick those compostable items
out of the compostable stream because it simply
does not compost.
It does not compost.
I mean the company might tell you it composts.
Oh, you don't believe me.
The company might tell you it composts.
It might compost, over six months, maybe a year.
But the composting facility of San Francisco which
is top notch and is super hot-- I gotta say,
I put my hand in there.
My hand got like-- you could not keep
your hand in the compost pile.
They cannot compose those materials.
And I think the problem also with those materials
is like it confuses people.
People are like, is this compostable?
It's recyclable.
Well, I don't know.
I mean I don't have compost, so I'll put it in the recycling.
But you put it in the recycling, your tainting the recycling
chain.
So you're basically throwing an item that's not
recyclable in the recycling.
And then it's basically tainting the chain.
So it's important to stay away from those products.
It's like as if we're trying to replace
one problem with another.
Let's just re-embrace the reusables
that our grandparents were using.
It's that simple.
So we don't need to invent something new.
We already have all the solutions with us.
MALE SPEAKER: And to your point, yeah, we do.
We have, here at Google, a lot of
the compostable plastic cups.
And we've gone to the facility and they all
say the same thing.
You'll see them after they go--
BEA JOHNSON: Thank you.
MALE SPEAKER: --through the pile, and there's still
a full cup or a full fork.
So they don't really like that material even though--
BEA JOHNSON: Well, also, I think in a lot of people's minds,
compostable means it's going to go away.
People think compostable also means just evaporating.
Like if it's litter and it's on the ground,
it's just going to one day disappear.
It's not the case.
I mean my street is filled with the compostable ice cream
spoons.
And I've contacted the company.
I'm like, oh, you use them because they're compostable?
They're not in a compost.
They're on my street.
And they're not disappearing.
MALE SPEAKER: Well, thank you so much, Bea.
And thank you all for coming.
This was really fun.
BEA JOHNSON: Yeah.
Thank you for having me.
[APPLAUSE]
MALE SPEAKER: And just so you all--