Calgary store tells customers to bring reusable containers to cut landfill waste

No waste store open for business A new local business wants to revolutionize the way you shop. Stephanie Wiebe has details on the Zero Waste Market.

Besides bringing reusable bags on trips to the grocery store, a new store in Calgary is urging its customers to bring in their own food containers too.

Canary Refillery and Zero Waste Market encourages its customers to bring in their own containers as a way to reduce unnecessary packaging and help put the environment first.

Co-owner Tara Meyer hopes their method reduces the amount of waste that ends up in a landfill -- especially single-use products and containers.

“If you consider the entire life cycle of that product -- it's a lot of energy [and] resources that go into something that's actually used for 10 minutes,” she told CTV Calgary.

With a store also in Toronto, the owners have set up a fairly simple system.

Whenever customers are low on items like kitchen and bath products, they can bring in their own containers, refill them with what they need and weigh them on the scales in the store.

The process is comparable to other retailers like Bulk Barn, where customers can customize exactly how much of a certain item they want.

“A lot of these products that we have [including containers] are meant to potentially last a lifetime, if they are well cared [for],” she said.

While the store puts an emphasis on eco-friendly products, it isn’t 100 per cent plastic-free. But Meyer hopes Canary Refillery helps people strive for a more eco-conscious lifestyle.

“I have little ones and I think that it's so important to really consider this and teach our little people that we have to do things differently,” she said.