How is your Plastic Free July going?
I have some more plastic free swaps to share with you soon, however this week I decided to try to tackle my ongoing issue of single-use plastic water filters (for my fridge-freezer).
Two years ago, I contacted Samsung to find out if their filters could be recycled and back then they simply said no, however I am happy to say that progress has at least been made this time in that they have now pointed me towards Watercare who at least offer to recycle used filters. The downside is that you do need to send the filters to them as there are no collection points.
https://www.watercare.co.uk/recycling-water-filters
I have raised this issue with Samsung and pointed out that when a customer buys a fridge-freezer I very much doubt that they check to see how much the filters are going to cost them and so to add a small amount to the cost of the filter to cover a FREEPOST or collection system would surely help to encourage more customers to recycle their filters. It is understandably very off putting for consumers to visibly see the cost of disposing of an item and so I really do think that it should be factored into the initial cost instead.
A reuseable filter would obviously be a much better option, however personally I am now doing some research to decide if I even need to filter my water or if I can just use my water dispenser to cool the water without the filter?
As responsive as Samsung has been via email this week though I still wanted to make sure that the issue of single use water filters was a bit more visible (and inconvenient) for them and so I decided to deliver my last 3 used filters round to their head office (just 10 minutes away from me) last week and addressed them to their Corporate Vice President.
Corporations need to start taking responsibility for the full life cycle of their products and we as consumers have the power to remind them of that responsibility.