Interview: Jill Barker talks dirty about washable nappies and her Green Baby initiative

SmartPlanet talks to Jill Barker, founder of Green Baby and author of baby green, a handbook for parenting in eco-friendly style.

SmartPlant: Firstly, we'd like to ask about the whole nappy question. Are you still of the mind that reusable ones are the greenest option?
Jill Barker: The government keeps saying things and nobody knows what's best. The big problem is waste: think about it -- we don't have any space left for all the nappies we're throwing away. Someone brings out one piece of research that says one thing and someone says something else. I think it will go on for a long, long time. At the end of the day, I believe it's better to be using washables.

SP: So regardless of whether it's a few kilowatt-hours extra to use disposables or reusables, there's still the landfill issue?
JB: It's the waste, it's the methane gas that's being released -- there's so many other factors. Apparently the government has got this new report coming out, yes. They're re-looking at it, and we're hoping that they come out more in favour of washables.

SP: Have your spies heard much about what's in the report?
JB: The main thing is what WEN [Women's Environmental Network] picked up on -- the government suggestion of washing your nappies at something like 90 degrees. Nobody washes their nappies at 90, nobody irons them and nobody uses the quantities that they put down. So I think they’ve gone back and said 'you better look at more realistic data here'.

SP: Since you started Green Baby back in 1999, how has what you can get in terms of reusables improved?
JB: It's changed so much. It's huge now, in terms of washable nappies and the choice out there. I think there are something like 40 different styles of washable nappies these days. All you have to do is look on the internet to see how many washable nappy companies there are out there, and all of a sudden they're in Waitrose and John Lewis -- they're kind of mainstream, which is great. I was laughed at when I started selling washable nappies on the high street, but I'm just one of many now.

SP: So when parents come to your shop, what do you think their main green concern is? Is it climate change, is it chemicals or is it something else?
JB: The latest research showed the environment is really about third. Health and quality are the top two. Most people are saying we're all concerned and we all want to do our bit, but I think health is something -- especially with children -- that is more at the forefront.

SP: Like with organic food then?
JB: Yes, I think that's the research that’s coming out about organic food. Why are we buying it? Okay so we're concerned about the environment -- but when you’re trying to sell things you do end up pushing that it’s healthier. The added bonus is that yes, it's healthier for the planet as well.

SP: I notice you've started selling your own skin products range for babies. How do you go about designing those and what's the green angle to them?
JB: Most of them were formulated for my son when he was having rashes. A friend of mine was an aromatherapist and he helped with the original formulations; now we have a company that makes them all for us and every so often we come up with some new things like sleep balm and chest rub gel. We're working with aromatherapists to come up with natural, old-fashioned remedy formulas -- it's not rocket science.

SP: On that front, do you think it's important they're organic?
JB: We tried to get everything organic, but it isn't possible. As time goes by you're getting more and more organic products. If there starts to be a demand then people will start producing organic. It's like with food – you're seeing a lot more organic ingredients on the food labels, and it will be the same with the toiletries.

SP: The majority of your baby clothes are organic cotton. As a parent, what sort of mark-up can I expect to pay?
JB: We pay extra premiums, so the organic cotton comes at a premium and we pay something like 15 per cent premium to the organic cotton farmer. If there's a fair trade premium as well, that gets paid to the farmer. That's what the customer must understand -- if there is a mark-up it's not my mark-up, it goes back to the farmers for them to convert to organic, because it's a huge task for them. They're used to using pesticides and they come under so much pressure from the pesticide groups who want them to use their pesticides. To get them away from that you need to pay them extra to encourage them, and we have to pass that message on to the consumer. It's about trying to do better – not about doing 'less worse'.

SP: Do you think the whole notion of green parenting is still the preserve of the middle classes?
JB: For me, it's a south-east England kind of thing. Most of my customers are based in London, which I guess is your middle class. And until we can get it filtered out there that you can save money being green, we're still just scratching the surface. We need to go after the masses, not keep going after the mid- to upper-market. What we're trying to do in 2008 is to push it out how much you can save being green and once you get that message across you'll get so many more people converted.

SP: How green are you at home in terms of your energy use?
JB: What we're trying to do is renovate our new house 'green'. It's not easy at all. I'm in this green space and I'm finding it difficult, so I don't know how the normal Joe-public goes about doing it. It's not accessible to a lot of people. I found a company called Green Steps, a new young business advising people and supplying them with everything they need to green their house.

SP: I notice you've just opened a store in Taiwan. That seems bizarre -- is there a big environmental movement going on over there?
JB: Apparently so, yes. I think Taiwan is an interesting one because, like Britain, it's an island so there's the same sort of issues -- landfill is at a premium, and you're very aware of the environment when you live on an island. Now China is getting very switched on to the environment too. People are getting sick, and there's illnesses they didn't use to have; they've got such huge amounts of manufacturing and pollution going on they're starting to ask questions. Also, with the one-child-per-family policy they're very concerned to keep their child healthy so the whole green thing would work.

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