Your marketplace for sustainable solutions
Walking between the deserted rows of cubicles after hours at her old office, Veronica Shannon couldn’t help but notice the small waste basket under every desk brimming with discarded food packaging.
All that waste got her thinking: there must be a better way to tackle the overflowing rubbish bin without asking her colleagues to sacrifice tasty meals.
“But when I brought my own container in to the local cafe all those years ago it was rejected,” Veronica recalls. “They refused to serve food in it because the plastic had some stains on it – they couldn’t tell if it was clean or not.”
Veronica realised it wasn’t just consumer attitudes and habits that needed to change. For people to be able to reuse containers at their favourite lunch spots, vendors and their staff needed to have confidence in the product.
For people to be able to reuse containers at their favourite lunch spots, vendors and their staff needed to have confidence in the product.
Its clever design earned retub the Good Design Award for Design Excellence in July this year, and has landed it on the list of finalists for the Victorian Premier’s Sustainability Award.
Which is where retub comes in. Retub is a product and a service, an attractive reusable container that comes in four distinct colour schemes – bees knees, clean seas, corporate hippie and green thumb.
“There were a few parameters we had to address when we created the premium takeaway container,” Veronica explains. “First, food vendors had to be able to visually assess its cleanliness.”
To make this as simple as possible, the container’s interior layer lifts out. It is made from glass, so any mess can be quickly seen and washed by hand or in a dishwasher.
“The glass container is then held by the outer base,” Veronica says, “providing thermal protection so you won’t burn your fingers on hot soup, and also acting as a double wall to retain heat and protect the glass from bumps and knocks.”
The container’s lid also has a steam release vent that can be removed to double as a food scoop at a pinch.
Its clever design earned retub the Good Design Award for Design Excellence in July this year, and has landed it on the list of finalists for the Victorian Premier’s Sustainability Award.
“We’re absolutely thrilled,” Veronica says, “but not totally surprised. For us, every choice is deliberate – we know that creating a stylish product is a way to get change happening on a large scale, and not just for the die-hard sustainability people.”
To support customers using the containers, retub is able to set any food vendor with a basic supply of replacement glass inners – completely free of charge.
We’re getting really great feedback.”
“This means if a user goes to a cafe with a dirty container because they’d eaten yoghurt in the morning, the cafe can use the container even if they’re too busy to clean it right away. They simply swap out the glass layer and retain it to wash when they have the time.”
ReTub is being used by clients such as the Hobart City Council, and is stocked by retailers such as Biome and Flora & Fauna.
“We’re also in the final throws of rolling out a project in Bendigo,” Veronica says.
Thanks to that city’s waste reduction grant, the team has set up a network of 45 food vendors with the retub system, meaning consumers can go to almost any takeaway place they want without creating packaging waste.
“We’re getting really great feedback,” Veronica says.
Stay tuned for more updates from retub.
