plastic is cheap. that's usually the benefit of it for manufacturers and consumers alike. but remember that phrase "if it's too good to be true, it probably is." that's plastic summed up.
yes plastic is cheap, but that comes at a bigger cost. the rubbish truth about plastic, is that it's rubbish. worse still, it's non-biodegradable rubbish. why does that matter? let me put it like this....every single piece of plastic ever created still exists, and we've been making this dirty material since 1907. worse still 50% of all plastic ever created was made in the past 15 years. it's still sat there somewhere. in our homes. in landfills. in oceans. everywhere.
it takes around 1000 years for plastic to breakdown. we're just over 100 years into the first piece of plastic breaking down. it's all sat there, clogging up our beautiful planet, disrupting the balance of land and marine life and then it finds its way back into our food chain. we only have ourselves to blame.
sure plastic is cheap, but the cost we are paying environmentally is huge.
30kg of plastic is the average weight of plastic rubbish an average New Zealander will create per year (recycling only around 5.8kg).....and when a beached sperm whale post mortem was completed in 2018, guess how much plastic was found in its stomach....30kg. wrapped up in its stomach were discarded fishing nets, plastic bags and so much more. and that was just one whale. now I'm not saying one particular New Zealander caused this whales death....every person on the planet contributes to the imbalance of life due to our lack of consideration. each and every one of us has a responsibility to act as guardians of the earth for the next generation.
so sure plastic is cheap, and eco products might have a slightly higher up front cost, but they are safer from our environment, made from organic materials, are designed for longevity the same as plastic but biodegrade much quicker. you could buy 52 bottles of water from the servo over a year, spend $52, create up to 52,000 years of plastic waste and throw 52 bottles away. or you could spend the same amount upfront on a reusable non-plastic water bottle which could last you 20+ years.