Love Logs was born out of one couple’s love for pizza and hatred for plastic. We were so shocked by the amount of plastic used to package the pizza oven logs we bought and we couldn’t believe how dependent the entire firewood industry was on single use plastic bags and nets. We wanted to change that.

When we first launched Love Logs, we had a vision that no plastic would ever enter our office or warehouse. We’d demand that all our packaging suppliers shipped our cardboard boxes to us 100% plastic free and we’d reject any deliveries that turned up in shrink wrap. We’d use pencils instead of plastic pens and we wouldn’t ever bring in a pre-packed supermarket sandwich. We were going to be a zero plastic, zero waste business.

Then we realised…it’s just not possible.

Companies are so reliant on plastic that they simply don’t have the capacity to ship products without it. When you order 500 cardboard boxes, they arrive on a pallet held on by a plastic pallet strap. As a start-up, we couldn’t demand bigger businesses changed their processes – they would just refuse to sell to us. We could either accept that we were going to create some plastic waste but hope that we could drive change in our own industry, or we could give up.

With working long hours, it was so easy to forget lunch and be forced to pop to Tesco to get a sandwich. We’d order lunch from UberEats and they’d send plastic cutlery. We’d order office supplies from companies advertising ‘plastic free packaging’ and they’d turn up covered in plastic tape and shrink wrap.

We got disheartened.

It’s so easy to beat yourself up for not doing more. We love businesses like Plastic Freedom who give us so many great, easy swaps, and we use them wherever we can, but it’s still almost impossible to live totally plastic free in our society. We feel so passionately that businesses need to change, not consumers. When potato starch bags are available for shipping magazines, why are companies still using plastic bags? When compostable food bags exist, why are the big supermarkets still packing their salad leaves in single use plastic bags? When aluminium cans are infinitely recyclable, why the hell do Coca Cola still sell drinks in plastic bottles?

Depressingly, the answer is usually cost.

We realised, we won’t be perfect, and we can’t change the world overnight, but we can drive significant change in our industry, and we think there are enough of you out there who are happy to pay a little bit more to come on the journey and help us do that!

Therefore, our plastic free pledge is

1. We will never use any plastic in our own packaging. At all. Ever.
2. We will constantly work with our suppliers to minimize the amount of plastic they use when shipping to us, even if it means paying more (which it usually does!)
3. We won’t send any plastic to landfill

We use Reworked to recycle and upcycle difficult materials which would normally be thrown away, at our own cost. Any plastic that comes into our warehouse goes into the Reworked box to be made into something new.

We know that we're still at the beginning of what is going to be a long journey, but it's great to see that other companies in our industry have already followed our lead and started selling firewood in plastic free packaging which is awesome! If only they'd stop importing it too...

We’d love to hear about what plastic free swaps you’re making! Let us know on Facebook and Instagram, or email info@love-logs.com