Reduce, reuse, recycle. We’ve all heard it. And hopefully, we’ve all practiced it in different ways.
Most of us who are lucky enough to live in communities with access to regular recycling services have mastered the last one. More and more thrift, vintage and second-hand stores popping up in our neighbourhoods makes the second tenant easier to tackle too. But the first one – reducing not only how much we consume but also how much waste we produce – seems to give us all a little more trouble.
empyri exists in the space where Traditional Chinese Medicine meets modern science, which we know means harnessing the unsung health & wellness properties of our star ingredient, high botanical root extract. But it also means approaching environmentalism from a perspective that regards the anti-waste values inherent to practices of TCM as well as the modern science that tells us we must change our consumer behaviour in order to protect Mother Earth for generations to come.
Many food-based cultural practices are anti-waste. Recipes are designed to incorporate every part of an animal or plant. Or if you’re like me, you’ve had a grandparent bellowing, “waste not, want not!” each time a meal is served at the dinner table. TCM is no different in its regard for the plant. The Shen Nong Ben Cao Jing makes reference to all parts of the plant, including leaves, seeds, stem and roots for therapeutic use. And in today’s world, we must lessen the waste burden on the earth by reducing our consumption and importantly, by using more of what we already have. In the beauty industry this philosophy is put into practice through by-product beauty[1], also known as circular beauty or zero waste beauty[2] - and it’s a trend that is here to stay.
Canada’s growing industry presently discards the roots of the plants used to fuel its profit – but empyri is paving the way for incentive-based sustainability of plants by offering farmers a reason to covet the roots just as much as the leaves. Education is vital to this environmental journey, so please, join us in sharing our good news about the power of the plant all the way down to its root. Oh, and keep reminding your neighbour that they do need to wash out their peanut butter jar before they stash it in the blue box!
At empyri, we love people, which is why we’ve created a product line to deeply nourish our community from the root. We also love the earth, and we are committed to its care through values and practices of anti-waste, environmentalism and sustainability. We hope you care about Mother Earth as much as we do, because
You are loved.
[1] https://www.byrdie.com/2020-beauty-trends-4779832
[2] https://www.globalcosmeticsnews.com/upcycling-and-beauty-all-hail-the-by-product-beauty-ingredient-movement/
Author Bio: Jennifer is the president and founder of empyri. Jennifer’s passion for formulation and product development was set ablaze in 2019, when she incorporated the healing power of cannabis roots into her long-standing three-step skin care system. Armed with scientific evidence on the actives in cannabis roots and seeds, a clean and conscious brand was born. Using her masters degree in bio-chemical engineering, Jennifer is forging a path to ...READ FULL BIO |