Did you know that, with an estimated 12.5 million dogs in the UK, each producing on average 340g of waste a day – or 4,250 tonnes – they produce enough methane gas to power more than 300,000 homes for a year?
What I’m trying to say is – that’s a lot of dog poo.
And if 12.5 million dog owners were responsible pet parents, they’d likely use 1-2 poo bags per dog, per day, right? That’s like, more than 25 million poo bags – a day.
And what I’m getting at here is – that’s a lot of poo bags.
It’s no secret the devastating effects that plastic has on the environment, so we always make a conscious effort to buy compostable poo bags – often opting for the planet-friendly Adios Plastic waste bags.
Founder Ben launched the idea for Adios Plastic in 2017 when he wanted to reduce his single plastic consumption, and wanted to produce a pet-centric product. And after months of research, learned that ‘almost all dog poo bags on the market are not as eco-friendly as they claim’.
Read more: Doo-Kee: the £5 tool which means you never have to carry a poo bag again
Biodegradable and degradable poo bags are not the same as compostable – and it may appear to a customer that they’re buying a product that’s good for the planet. But degradable and biodegradable labels are often greenwashing and using marketing loopholes to deceive customers with unregulated guidelines – whereas compostable items are held to a strict criteria.
Ben explained: “A degradable bag is a petroleum-based plastic bag that can take up to 1,000 years to breakdown, all the while building up within the food chain having potentially devastating effects on the animals that consume them.
“Biodegradable bags are basically degradable bags with an EPI additive to speed up the breakdown process. It is not clear how long biodegradable bags with this additive take to breakdown and the science behind it is not widely supported.”
Read more: Denzel’s go 100% plastic-free with new compostable packaging
However, Adios’ corn-starch compostable bags safely breakdown back into the earth in as little as 90 days when composted – leaving no harmful chemicals or micro-plastics behind.
The 100% home compostable, zero waste bags are said to be strong enough to hold a house brick – which means they’re definitely strong enough to hold Phoebe and Frank’s business. The durable bags are 20 microns thick, whereas average poo bags are only 15-18 microns.
I love how on the Adios website, you can take a survey based on your poo bag needs, and it will recommend the best product to buy. It asks if you’d like handles not on a roll, handles on a roll, or no handles on a roll, before offering colour options and pack sizes.
Read more: Inside the Bearkind eco-friendly dog subscription box
We decided to get the 60 rainbow poo bags that are without handles on a roll, costing £5.99. There are 15 bags per roll, coming in pink, purple, green and blue. Customers can make a one-off purchase, or subscribe to receive poo bags every month, or every two, three or six months – saving 10% on the price, making the Adios Plastic waste bags from 7p each.
My only wish for Adios Plastic is that they bring their rainbow bags out with a handles option. At the moment, their loose bags with handles only come in grey, but their handled poo bags on a roll do also come in coral pink – but it would be great for customers to have the choice to pick handles or no handles in all of the colours.
While you can dispose of these in the regular rubbish bin, Ben urges owners to choose a disposal method which won’t lead to their product going into landfill.
Read more: How BrewBix turn upcycled brewery grain into eco-friendly dog biscuits
He said: “There are various options for disposal that you can do yourself with compostable bags. The most popular is to compost them at home yourself, separate to food waste, as you cannot use the compost for edible plants as the poop may still have pathogens present.”
In addition to having produced a plastic free poo bag product that dog owners love, Adios also donate 1% from every sale to charities that help clean up oceans and protect wildlife.
Buy them here on the Adios Plastic website, or order at Hounds and save 10% with the code SCAMPS.
