Bea Johnson’s book Zero Waste Home is a practical guide to zero waste, based on Bea’s personal experience living a zero-waste life with her family. Bae wrote this book so she could share what she has learned with the hopes of inspiring others to start their own zero waste journey.Â
About the Zero-Waste Lifestyle
Zero Waste is all about reducing the amount of waste you are responsible for, reusing wherever possible, and only using recycling and eco-bricking as a last resort.Â
Bea Johnson is known as the founder of the Zero Waste Lifestyle Movement. But just like most other zero wasters, Bea started out her life with “shelves full of things you only use once and then throw away.”Â
About the author
Bae and her family used to live in a big house filled with all of their stuff. They decided to make a change, and move to a neighborhood where they could live within walking distance of their kid’s school, cafes, libraries, and hiking trails. While looking for their new home, they stayed in an apartment, with just the basics.
Temporarily living with less, made them realise that they had more time to spend together as a family and do things that they enjoyed. And they realised that they didn’t miss their stuff. The neighborhood they moved to was more expensive than where they had lived before so when they bought a new home which was half the size of their previous one, they had to purge 80% of their stuff.
What we truly did not use, need, and love had to go
Bea Johnson
Their new simplified life allowed them more time, which they used to read books and watch documentaries about environmental issues. Until that point, they had been disconnected from the negative impact their actions had on the already endangered planet, which their children will inherit. For the sake of their children’s future, they drastically changed their consumption habits and lifestyle. Where better to start making changes than at home.
With the new-found knowledge that plastics were devastating our oceans, they realised that recycling was not the answer, and so they went on a journey to live a more environmentally friendly lifestyle. They drastically reduced their waste, which used to consist of mainly single-use packaging, bought packaging-free, and switched to reusables.Â
Their new lifestyle evolved and soon Bea, Scott, and their two boys Max & Léo were living a life with the goal of striving to live Zero Waste. In 2009 Bae’s husband Scott, quit his job and started a sustainability consulting company, while Bae started a blog called Zero Waste Home, where she shared various aspects of their zero-waste lifestyle. In 2013 Bae published Zero Waste Home: The Ultimate Guide to Simplifying Your Life by Reducing Your Waste
About the book
The goal of Zero Waste Home is not for everyone one who reads it to generate zero waste, which we know is not possible. Bae hopes that people who have read her book will come to realise the harmful effects our purchasing power can have on our endangered planet. The book is a step by step guide, packed full of practical tools and tips that will hopefully inspire people to reduce their waste and make other positive changes to their lifestyles that will be better for the planet and for us.Â
“We – mothers fathers and citizens – have the right, if no the duty, and certainly the power, to bring positive change to the world through our daily decisions and actions.”
Bae Johnson
Since its release Zero Waste Home has been translated in over 25 languages, most of which are bestsellers, and has remained a #1 bestseller on Amazon in its category since the book’s publication in 2013.
Where to buy?
You can buy the kindle (paperless) version of this book on Amazon or get a hard copy (softcover) from Shop Zero or from Loot.
Have you read Zero Waste Home or is there another zero-waste book that you would love for me to read? Let me know in the comments below.  I’ll be adding more book recommendations soon! If you’d like to see green and vegan products I have found browse my Product Directory. Alternatively, If you are looking for some vegan recipe inspiration, have a look here.Â
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