Matt Chat — Confessions of an addicted Consumer: Update #1

They say admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovering… and having confronted my avid consumerism in my first blog post, 5 months ago, how have I fared?

Well, it’s fair to say (much like many of my old school reports) there’s definite room for improvement especially when it comes to the bigger, bolder aspects of my consumption e.g. travelling and shopping. For example, I still haven’t shaken my Prime habit (apparently nowhere else sells Sashimi grade salmon?!), I took a business class flight to Dubai in between lockdowns and my Pret subscription remains unchallenged. But that said I have made some great changes to positively address my consumption and shift it towards a more sustainable model.

Starting with the largest carbon outlet I had, I only took 2 flights (one return flight), down from 17 flights in the same period last year; ok a global pandemic and a national lockdown in the UK heartily aided this, but it’s changing my perception of what ‘time off’ means. Turns out, staying at home can be pretty fun and I am not defined by my frequent flyer status(!)…who knew eh?!

Lower level, I upcycled two items for Christmas gifts and encouraged a friend to sponsor an animal for another friends Secret Santa present instead of the obligatory Trump loo roll or ‘grow your own girlfriend’ tat (Sorry Riy).. it’s not all bad he did get a cute penguin toy out of it.

But most pressingly, I’ve also made a whole host of small lifestyle choice changes, these are what I would describe as ‘easy win’s’ they’re not hard to do, unlike what is hard — trying to change everything you do all at once… and beating yourself up about it. That was probably my biggest learning so far, the secret to all of this is incremental and tactical changes. Changes which can be sustained, don’t impact you too greatly and as a result are easy for climate change denyers to get on board with.

From a sustainability context that means fewer plastic bottles being bought and less plastic items heading into our seas, or more people requesting electric car charging points, increasing the charging infrastructure for us all to benefit from. And as you can see in the image below (lifted from Linkedin so thank you to whoever created this!)— if we all make a few tactical changes, we can make a big collective difference to the impact on our futures.

For inspiration, here are a number of tactical substitutions/changes I’ve made which you might like to try:

- Shifted my Nutmeg portfolio to be entirely invested in sustainable funds

- Shifted my homepage from Google to Ecosia (they plant a tree every time you search!)

- Bought a Nespresso pod inverter so you can recycle pods

- Started making my own sourdough (great while it lasted, but apparently even 80-year-old starter can be killed if you treat it badly enough)

- Switched all of my home cleaning products to Method and Ecover — both 100% natural and plant based… and smell delightful too.

- Applied for the lamppost outside my flat to be converted into a charging point for an electric vehicle. Turns out every London Borough has funds to do so!

- Cut my meat consumption to just two meals a week

- Bought as many of my Christmas presents from independents as I could (TKMaxx did still get a fair whack of my trade, but it is a fabulous shop in my defence)

- Subscribed to Lime bikes and racked up 31km cycling between parks for walks

- Created a compost bin and stopped binning any wet waste

- Sold 3 items I was planning on binning on Facebook Marketplace, turns out the adage ‘one man’s waste is another man’s treasure’ is very much real

Things on my to do list:

- Buy a bike

- Buy an electric car

- Switch energy supplier to Octopus energy, which is entirely green

- Cut out all meat from my diet

- Switch to Honest Mobile — the world’s first carbon negative mobile network

- Sign up for a treecard when it launches — a sustainable payment card made from wood

In summary if you want to start being greener and more sustainable, don’t try and boil the ocean — if like me, you love yourself the convenience of a home delivery — don’t abruptly stop them and start forcing yourself to walk the 3 mile roundtrip to Battersea Waitrose laden with all your groceries (it’s not fun, trust me on this). Opt for more sustainable offerings like new London Grocery services Weezy, Farmdrop or Smith and Brock (all I can highly recommend). Set yourself small challenges, like composting all your food waste one week; or keeping the heating below a certain amount; or walking to meet friends instead of driving/getting the bus … it’ll soon add up and seem nothing at all.

If we all do nothing, we get nothing; but if we all do one small thing differently every day it’ll add up to huge changes in the longer term. And small change is easy.

Good luck!