Buying Locally Made

Having talked about how our aim is to be more ‘green’ (for want of a better phrase), in our buying habits, how well do we do? The honest answer is, not perfect by any means, but we’re getting there. When it comes to clothes for the children, we are still more ‘mainstream’ than we would ideally like. Although we get stuff from M&S, Next and Boden, we only buy what they need, when they need it. Anything with plenty of wear left in it either gets passed to other parents for their younger ones, or goes to charity; unless something is 90% holes and 10% threads, none of it goes to landfill.

As adults of course, (barring a major change in body shape!) we don’t outgrow our clothes. This allows us to buy from much more sustainable sources, since the added cost is mitigated by the long useful life – not so for children!

There are a multitude of UK and European manufactured clothes and shoes, some of which even have a lifetime guarantee and free repair service. This all means a smaller footprint and with it a clearer conscience… Examples of these include:

Moving on to household items, such as white goods, cleaners and more, there are a number of great UK manufactured products available, so you don’t always have to buy goods which have been shipped over 9,000 miles. The following is a (non-exhaustive!) list of what we have currently found to be UK manufactured – this means not simply assembled from a kit of Chinese made parts! Please let us know if you find any more companies to add, or if you discover that any in our list have moved production.

UK Manufacturers

Green Energy Products

Air source heat Pumps — Ebac: https://ebac.com/heatpumps

Solar batteries — (List to follow)

EV chargers — (List to follow)