Courtney Fillion, founder of Just Toledo, makes small batch, all natural, biodegradable household products, like eco-friendly bath and body products, reusable grocery bags and more. Just Toledo delivers to specific zip codes, ensuring that their locally sourced products avoid excessive shipping mileage and the accompanying waste while reducing / minimizing the company’s carbon footprint. Fillion says, “There is a tether, a story, between you and the things you make,” and her local, handmade, green lifestyle is an enriching and instructive experience. Fillion explains, “It’s a different way to collect endorphins.”
Eco-friendly processes
Environmentally friendly processes is a term referring to sustainability and marketing for goods and services, laws, guidelines and policies that reduce or minimize harm to ecosystems or the environment. For those new to the concept, start by questioning your relationship with nature. Here are two key questions to reflect on as consumers in an interconnected ecosystem:
- Do you believe humans have a moral obligation to protect and preserve the environment? Does nature have ‘instrumental value’ or ‘intrinsic value’? Instrumental value is the concept that nature exists for human beings. Intrinsic value acknowledges that nature is to be respected and honored, not just as it is useful for human interests.
- What are the root causes of contemporary attitudes and practices with respect to the natural environment, and how can we change them? Since humans share air and waterways but often hold contradicting morals, where can you begin making your individual contribution that aligns with your environmental principles? How can you live in alignment with nature and our surrounding biodiversity so that all surviving organisms can inhabit and thrive on a healthy Earth?
Start by making eco-friendly lifestyle decisions and product purchases
Start by making eco-friendly lifestyle decisions and product purchases Embodiment of your values in consumer decisions and lifestyle choices can contribute to leaving a lighter footprint on this Earth and inspiring eco-consciousness in your friends and family. But, as with most new endeavors, it’s important to start small, make incremental shifts and accept that this journey won’t be perfect. Change, regardless of the scope of that change, involves a level of sacrifice — more effort, time or an initial upfront investment. A zero-waste lifestyle is impossible for most people, but that comes with privilege. But if, one by one, we start with small shifts in our behavior, our collective actions have potential to evolve into sustainable lifestyles while creating a healthy biodiverse environment for all.
Fillion demonstrates how ingenuity and sacrifice can be used to create a sustainable, eco-friendly lifestyle in Toledo with her mission to keep waste out of landfills and waterways, and to create products and a delivery structure that is safe for people and the planet.
Fillion relates, “Start thinking about the effects of your behavior and choices — what you clean your dishes with, your laundry detergent, everything you wash with, goes down the drain, and all of that goes into our shared waterways and it really matters. It’s all connected.”
@justtoledo on Instagram
If you are considering the use of more eco-friendly products, start with one item and try it out. Maybe it’s laundry detergent or dish soap. Maybe it’s eco-friendly bath and body products. The key is to look into what is in the product, how it is sourced and how it’s stored. Then, get creative! How can you reuse the container? Can you use the product without a container? Ask yourself, does this purchase preserve and protect the environment? Remember, start small. Eco-friendly living is an ongoing learning process.
Fun & useful environmentally friendly tips and ideas…
