Saving the Last Drop: New Design With Simple Approach to Reducing Waste

What does it take to make a sustainable bottle of shampoo? Ingredients and manufacturing techniques and transportation all matter, but there's one little detail that often gets overlooked: most personal care products live in packaging that automatically wastes the last little bit inside. In fact, 25 percent of most bottled liquids like lotions ends up in the trash, just because it's hard to squeeze out.

This is probably cause for a major packaging redesign from personal care manufacturers. But in the meantime, here's another solution. This bottle holder, called myBotto, suspends lotion or hair gel upside down, so gravity forces out what can't be squeezed. It's designed to fit any bottle and be reused over and over. If this can help save that extra 25 percent of a product, it's also saving 25 percent of the energy that went into making and transporting it. The designers also recommend replacing pump dispensers—which also leave product behind—with simple caps.

Image courtesy of myBotto