Step aside NTUC, Cold Storage, Giant, CareerFour and whatnot, there is a new big GOOD brand in town for all of our daily necessities, called Scoop. Head down to your local grocery and you’ll see a ton of plastic packaging on food items, cleaning agents, everything has plastic covering it. But imagine if all those were eradicated, can you imagine the amount of plastic waste we can reduce in a year?

Singapore only recycles about 4% of the plastic collected annually, which means most plastics get incinerated after one-time use, losing ~95% of their material value. Furthermore, this action worsens pollution as incineration releases greenhouse gases.

Plastic Free Shopping

This high-end organic foods retailer fervently promotes its plastic-free shopping experience whereby shoppers either bring reusable boxes, purchase new mason glass jars (which can obviously be reused again) or simply use the paper bags provided. They then scoop up the amount they need and thus are very customisable to every individual’s needs and preferences. One can buy as much or as little as they like, reducing the likeliness of a person wasting food items purchased. The brand also works with local, sustainable ethical suppliers to bring the best quality at the best prices possible.

Beyond regular food items, Scoop also boasts tea, chocolates, oil and natural products from Australian farmers and small-batch producers. They are bought in bulk and sold to us consumers, via weight. No money is wasted on unnecessary and fanciful packaging. Due to the close proximity of Australia to Singapore, there is lesser carbon emissions via transportation compared to shipping organic food from further away places like the US.

As a nation that imports over 90% of food, the transportation of food by air significantly increases its environmental impact. Having buffet-style stores like Scoop which sources locally or sustainably drastically reduces our environmental impact via air pollution and also plastic waste.

Head down to your local Scoop

If you’ve yet to visit a Scoop outlet, make sure you do so soon! As an avid tea lover, Scoop has way too many flavours beyond your usual Lipton Black Tea Bags at Fairprice. My favourite has to be the Earl Grey, Rose & Lavender concoction. Since it is take as much as you wish, there is literally no boundary as t0 what tea combination one can enjoy. Another interesting section of Scoop for me has to be its Kombucha Taps.

As much as this posts sounds like an AD for Scoop, the shopping experience here truly changed my mind about plastic-free shopping. The amount of plastic generated from a single trip is one too many and going to Scoop made me realise that I could live without plastic bags; take only what I really need (as I then do not have to lug it home).

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