A new Cookeville business focused on sustainability by selling household products and cleaners in refillable containers.
Wonderfill Refillery will celebrate its official opening later this month. Founder Cora Hageman said said products are sold by weight rather than in individually packaged bottles.
“Being able to bring in your own container and refill instead of having to get a new one every time, that itself reduces waste overall,” Hageman said. “And out local vendors and our vendors we’re choosing to buy from wholesale also have pledges to keep plastic out of their company.”
For those who do not have a refillable container, Hageman said there are some available at the store. Hageman said about half of the refillery’s products are from wholesale makers, but the products themselves are made domestically with natural ingredients. She said other products, like soaps and prints, are made in Tennessee and in the Upper Cumberland.
Hageman said the vendors who source the refillery’s inventory only produce plastic on a closed loop cycle. If plastic is shipped in, the vendor will include a shipping label to return the plastic, so it can be sanitized and reused.
“In every way we are housing product in our store, we’re just trying to make sure we’re reducing plastic going out into the world and new plastic having to be made,” Hageman said.
Hageman said her goal to remove plastic came from the negative impacts it can have on the environment. Though she said she does not want to villainize plastic, it can cause problems if put into landfills.
“It takes million of years to break down,” Hageman said. “It does break down, and when it does, it leeches into our groundwater and into our environment, and eventually ends up in our bodies and in our animals and in our food. And we end up with microplastics in our bodies.”
Hageman said refilleries are common in western parts of the country, and she would see them everywhere when visiting relatives. She said she wanted to open one in the Upper Cumberland after realizing there were none in the area. Hageman said there are just six refilleries in Tennessee.
Hageman said the sustainability movement is one of simplicity, as there were far fewer single use plastics available even 20 years ago. She said having a refillery in the Upper Cumberland may help the movement catch on.
