Shop Installs Refillable Milk Vending Machine to Combat Plastic Pollution

A shop on Anglesey in Wales has installed a milk machine so customers can refill their glass bottles. In an effort to reduce waste, customers can buy or bring in their own glass bottles to fill.

Shop owner Paul Ellis said the idea is very popular. The 24 pint milk tank provides milk into glass or recycled bottles, instead of asking customers to buy milk in plastic containers each week. It’s usually emptied 2 to 3 times each day.

Residents are turned onto the idea and using it. The city council says is a “great example” of waste reduction. Anglesey became the first county in the UK to get “plastic free” community status from the Conservation group Surfers Against Sewage.

The shop also accepts plastics for recycling. They’ve taken toothbrushes and candy wrappers. As more people find out about the milk, the shop has been increasingly busy and is fielding calls from around Europe and North America.

Local environmentalists are praising the shop’s initiative. Kirsty Luff, of Friends of the Earth Cymru, commented, “It’s wonderful to see this milk refill scheme in Anglesey proving so popular with shoppers. The scourge of single-use plastics is all around us, so having more refill stations in shops of all sorts is exactly the direction we need to be heading.Now supermarkets must follow the lead of the growing number of zero-waste and independent shops by providing opportunities for shoppers to refill their containers during their grocery shop.”

Locavore, a Scottish grocery store, is offering a similar milk vending machine. Locavore has an express goal of zero waste, saying, “We’re in the pursuit of reducing packaging rather than recycling it,” according to a member of the Zero Waste team there. The company can get the milk directly from farmers, cutting out the middle man.

Grocery stores in the United States still lag in introducing a refillable scheme like this. One zero waste market, In.gredients in Austin, Texas, hoped that it’s “bring your own container” model would change consumer habits. But the company found it hard to change people habits and the store wasn’t profitable enough to stay open. A few small scale operations exist around the country, none have taken on the full grocery model, most seem to be bath and body product focused.

For larger consumer goods, organizations like Loop are starting to offer items in reusable packaging. They sell items like laundry detergent and soap. But there is more plastic being manufactured each day, and the ocean continues to fill with plastic.

Further still, these refillable milk containers should offer non-dairy beverages for refill. Dairy alternative “milks” are better for you and the planet. Introducing non-dairy beverages into schemes like this would reduce plastic, and help reduce carbon emissions.

Read more about dairy in One Green Planet. And get dairy-free recipes on One Green Planet. We also highly recommend downloading our Food Monster App, which is available for iPhone. The app has more than 15,000 plant-based, allergy-friendly recipes, and subscribers gain access to new recipes every day. Check it out!

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