Customers that buy Zero Co's products are given reusable containers made from recycled ocean plastics and sachets to hold liquids like stain removers and body wash. Zero-Co's resuable liquid pouches that are cleaned and refilled. When they finish up a product, they can send the packaging back to Zero Co, which will clean and re-fill the plastic vessels. Smith himself has tipped around $100,000 into the startup, which is yet to start its first round of production. It's an idea that formed while he and his wife took 18 months off to travel after the sale of Smith's last business, Cake Wines. He founded the brand in 2011 with friend Glen Cassidy, and sold out of the wine business in 2017.

"It was the trip of a lifetime, and we went to some far flung places and were blown away by the amount of plastic we saw everywhere... from the top of the Himalayas on the border of Bhutan and China, and on the Afghanistan border. Just places where there shouldn't have been any plastic, and it affected us," Smith says. In February he returned to Australia and started spending an "uncomfortable amount of time in supermarkets", watching how many single-use household products shoppers were adding to their trolleys. "Those last three aisles of the supermarket, they might not be the sexiest products but they are rampant for single-use plastics," Smith says. A few months ago he pitched the idea of a home products business to Chapman and soon closed off a $600,000 pre-seed raise. Chapman says he's seeing an increasing number of startups looking to crack the plastics problem.

"Mike was the first one that came to us with a closed loop business that got both ends of the supply chain," he says. Chairman of the Adelaide Crows and Zero Co investor, Rob Chapman. Credit:Josh Robenstone Zero Co's Kickstarter will aim to raise more than $240,000 to cover production costs for its first round of products. Public figures including musician Ash Grunwald have also supported the business on social media. Kickstarter backers will be able to buy packs of the products for either $79 or $129 depending on how many they want to try.

Smith is launching his business at a time when single-use plastics are making headlines across Australia. Prime Minister Scott Morrison even argued last week that ocean plastics pose "even more immediate threats" than climate change. Smith and his wife have moved back in with his parents while launching the business, working with a "skeleton staff" to get the idea off the ground. He believes now is the right time to pitch products to compete with mainstream supermarket brands. "Our mission here is to smash plastic, not people’s wallets, and never be more expensive than the big name supermarket brands," he says. Recycling rethink

The national focus on recycling has made Australians think twice about the products in their kitchens and bathrooms, says founder of $5 million eco-friendly store Biome, Tracey Bailey. "It is really has been about challenging this mindset that recycling is an ok solution for dealing with this plastic," she says. Tracey Bailey, from Biome. Bailey says it's traditionally been difficult to reduce single-use plastics in these product categories. "Ultimately, it's all about the packaging, and if it's a liquid it's very hard."

There's been a spike in the number of refillable products and natural soap alternatives over the past year, she says. "In the laundry, the number one plastic free solution at the moment is the soap berries or soap nuts — they are the berry straight off the tree and there are no synthetics." From re-usable coffee pods to metal straws, the plastics-free economy has taken off over the past couple of years. Smith believes Zero Co can be a competitor, though it will rest on generating enough customer interest to properly get off the ground. "We’re saying, we’ve got this vision, we just need your support now."

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