The Rise of the Humble Soap Bar

soap bars

We chat with the founder of Australia’s leading eco-store Biome on the increasing sales of the humble soap bar.

With more people becoming consciously aware of their impact on the environment, soap bars sales have significantly risen, with brands like Biome at the forefront of eco-products seeing a massive increase of at least 1600 percent in sales over twelve month for their soap bars.

People are becoming more aware of the global plastic crises and want to play their part in protecting this beautiful planet we call earth; our home and with the increase of naked products like soap bars being sold, it’s comforting to know the public are being more mindful with their purchases.

Founder of Biome, Tracey Bailey says these recent sales statistics show the humble soap bar is making a comeback from their previous 2.2 percent sales decline back in 2014 and 2015, where consumers were favouring liquid soap and body washes to the now increase of sales in soap bars over packaged soaps.

“These sales figures reflect consumers’ growing concerns about plastic waste and demonstrate their efforts to take action on this environmental issue, swapping body wash in plastic dispensers for soap bars in cardboard or no packaging is the easiest plastic free swap consumers can implement into their daily routines.

This consumer trend has likely been influenced by individuals’ and organisations’ actions to raise awareness of and reduce single use plastic waste such as the recent plastic bag ban and ABC’s War on Waste series.”

Following a similar trend, research from market analyst experts, Kantar Worldpanel, reveals sales of soap bars in the United Kingdom have increased by nearly three percent over the past year.

Biome’s sales report also reveals its annual soap bar sales comprise 50 per cent shampoo bars indicating consumers are further reducing plastic waste by swapping their conventional shampoo in a plastic bottle for a zero-waste shampoo bar.

“A shampoo bar is much like a bar of soap, but for your hair. You wet your hair, lather up and rinse, just as you would use a bar of soap to wash your body. Many people don’t realise the soft plastic shampoo and conditioner bottles and tubes cannot be recycled through council kerbside recycling and therefore end up in landfill.”

biome soap bar

Biome is dedicated to protecting the environment via an ethical and innovative retail business model that empowers customers to make a difference to the wellbeing of themselves and the planet through education, and by providing an extensive range of thoroughly-evaluated environmentally and socially-responsible products.

Biome offers its customers a TerraCycle recycling service for used shampoo and conditioner containers, but Bailey urges consumers to choose the completely waste free option.

“Recycling is a better option opposed to discarding these items in landfill, but it’s not the best solution. Using a soap bar that is completely zero waste is the most environmentally friendly solution.” 

To check out the full range of soap bars for body and hair at Biome, click here.

Rebecca Wilkinson

Beauty Editor

Rebecca is a freelance content creator and beauty editor for Bondi Beauty. She is a pescatarian, who may yet become vegan. She loves all things beauty, health & travel, has a weakness for coffee and is obsessed with cats and yoga. If she's not answering her mobile - it's probably because she's trying out the latest beauty trend, like massaging crushed pearls into her skin for the ultimate collagen and vitamin boost to skin cells.

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