0
was successfully added to your cart.

An enterprising way to reduce plastic pollution

By March 25, 2021Blog
M y name is Jan Pierce and up until last summer I was a headteacher in Derbyshire. I have been in education my entire life and to make a change was quite scary however, I am always one for a challenge and I have a drive to always find my ‘what next’.

For the past 5 years as a family, we have been really keen to ‘do our bit’ to save the planet and change/challenge the impact humans are having. In our home, we reviewed both our recycling and food shopping and made many changes including using plastic containers as re-fills for washing powder, washing up liquid, cleaning products and hair products.

I also began to reflect on the gifts I bought for family and friends. I looked for alternatives to anything wrapped in plastic. Then in July 2019 two colleagues left my school and I decided to make a leaving present. This didn’t go too well so I enrolled on a course to learn how to make handmade soap.

For Christmas 2019 I gave presents of handmade soap and shampoo along with sisal bags and bamboo soap dishes to family and friends (whether they liked it or not!). My message was clear – stop using soap in a dispenser or bars wrapped in plastic, stop using shampoo bottles, plastic shower puffs and plastic soap dishes.

The feedback I got was so positive and wholeheartedly people encouraged me to go into production and sell my products.

Once I had researched the safety reports needed to sell cosmetics in the UK/EU, I trialled making natural deodorant. Being a Headteacher at the time, I realised that children got through a lot of glue, so I asked the children to collect glue sticks. After a thorough clean and sterilisation, I re-used them to put the deodorant in. This idea came to me after having bought deodorant in cardboard tubes that go soggy around the edges.

Then in March 2020, I decided that I was going to leave education, to pursue my dream of creating products to encourage people to not use single use plastic. I am also a life coach looking to support teachers to help them find their true potential by focusing on their own well-being.

I resigned from my job in early March 2020 after a 30 year career in education and in September 2020, I launched Heart and Soul by JP.

It has been a steep learning curve however, as a headteacher I have gathered many skills so learning how to be an entrepreneur was a just another ‘next step’ for me.

Useful links

If you are interested in learning more about my products, then please visit my website www.heartandsoulbyjp.co.uk/shop

If you are a teacher and are interested in my coaching support the please visit my website www.heartandsoulbyjp.co.uk/life-coaching

Tags:

Get in touch! We’d love to hear your thoughts.

We are glad that you preferred to contact us. Please fill our short form and one of our friendly team members will contact you back.



    Input this code: captcha



    X
    CONTACT US