Last week we had the pleasure to interview Naomi Tarszisz of Replated for the Bondi Innovation Forum 2022.
Naomi is the Founder of Replated, which was born on a Sydney beach. In the 80s, Naomi’s parents took her to collect plastic rubbish on the beach at Rushcutters Bay. That was the start of her passion for protecting the environment. Flash forward three decades and Naomi found herself back at the same beach, collecting rubbish with her own children.As she picked up plastic bottles from the sand, she asked herself, ‘Why has nothing changed?’That’s when Naomi committed to ridding Australia of single-use plastic.
Naomi spent 20 years working in digital products and systems for well-known brands. She now brings that strategic nous to her role as an advocate for the reuse revolution. And so, RePlated was born. The intention? To make lovely, cost-effective, planet-friendly alternatives to chucking plastic containers in the bin.
In this interview she discusses this along with how she sees Bondi’s future growth.
Reach out to Naomi on the BIA platform or on Slack to discuss sustainability, environmental issues and BCorps.
Transcript
Hi. I’m Naomi Tarshish. I’m the founder of Replated. And we make reusable takeaway food containers and design systems to make reuse simple. I began with the problem. And the problem that I wanted to fix was single use. I grew up actually in Bondi, I’m a Bondi girl. And I used to do Keep Australia Beautiful day back in the 80s, when I was a kid, and I found I was back on those same beaches, picking up that same rubbish with my own kids. And it’s, that’s when it began, where I really decided that I wanted to do something in something meaningful to fix the problem of single use at its source. We’ve had really a look, we’ve been really lucky. We’ve won a bunch of awards the last couple of years in sustainability. We reckon we were recognised last year when we certified as a B Corp as the top 5%. In the world. We want to Circle Award as well last year in the inaugural sub Circle Awards in the b2b category. And we’re highly commended this year as a part of the circulars accelerator which was, which was run by the World Economic Forum and Accenture. So we’ve been we’ve had a lot of recognition. And really, we’re just starting to build up some fantastic customers in the corporate space, customers like Canva. And really looking, looking ahead this year, we’ve got a national bank coming on board in bringing repleted into their banks, so that the people in their teams don’t make waste at lunchtime. And I’m really excited about some of those. Well, we have our first precinct activation later this year, which will mean an entire building in the CBD, including the food court, completely single, use free. And that’s, that is our ambition. That’s what we want to do. And I think for us what’s next, I think what’s next, our whole cities, and we really want to see, we want, we want the promise of reuse to be achievable in both a work and an at home context. So our ambition is also to be able to make make that work for you whether you’re getting your food in person or you’re getting it delivered, whether you’re at work or at home. As I said, I’m gonna go sorry, I think there’s potential this amazing people that live in the city, amazing people that live in this suburb. And I think that the potential, the potential is huge, but anything where we have the potential to be a global city, we are a global city. Sounds terrible.
Oh, look, I think the support, like the support that you are building through this community is fantastic. It’s wonderful to meet like minded entrepreneurs, and to look and applaud other people’s successes and help help nurse them through their failures. And this, that space that we that we had was really incredible, and I’m looking forward to the next iteration.
