John Esparza, of Salon on Main, has decided to join GreenCircle Salons making his salon the first in Downtown to offer the environmentally friendly option to hair recycling.
GreenCircle Salons is a company bringing salons across the world together meeting the goal to turn all the North American salons renewable by 2020. Winners of the Gear Toronto Awards, GreenCircle Salons, addresses environmental issues causing concern with economics, social structure, and humanity as a whole. The program is liable, and 100% traceable offering a comprehensive recycling/repurposing program that ensures hair, foils, plastics, papers, color, ammonia, and perm solutions do not end up in our waste and water systems.
Five years ago when BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig blew up in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 people and unleashing the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history, more than 200 million gallons of oil was unleashed upon the ocean. Reports showed over 82,000 birds; 6,000 sea turtles; almost 26,000 marine mammals, including dolphins; and some fish and invertebrates were presumably harmed. Then came more than 2 million gallons of toxic dispersants used on the 1,000 miles of shoreline following the catastrophe making the waters even more toxic for the species of the region.
Hair floats attract oil and repel water better than almost any other substance. Manufactured from a mat or boom type netting, hair is being used by sustainable efforts across the globe in coordination with large-scale public efforts including everything from cleaning motor oil from storm drains to combating major oil spill disasters. Over 1,600 pounds of hair was shipped to the Gulf of Mexico by GreenCircle to help clean the BP oil spill in 2010.
First to Go Green!!!
“It’s just my way of showing that I care about the earth, and my clients appreciate this concept,” says Esparza who opened the salon in November 2010 explained his decision to go green, this Spring. “We now donate the hair we cut and about 95% of the materials we use at the salon are recyclable.”
Being funded by the Environmental Contribution Initiative, as a member of GreenCircle Salons Esparza’s salon will be even more sustainable as GreenCircle connects him to a network of industry professionals and sustainable companies who have or yet to have joined GreenCircle Salons movement.
While it may seem as though an environmentally friendly salon would be a more expensive option that is not the case, Esparza points out. There is only a “$1.50 surcharge increase” so mostly everyone seems to be on board. “If my clients don’t want to pay the surcharge, I let them know that they don’t have to, but I’ve only had one customer complain so far.”
The way it’s broken down is $1 goes to GreenCircle for their processing of recyclable services and the 50 cents stays in the house, and it goes toward cleaning products, green cleaners, and for other more environmentally friendly products the salon uses.
The clients are happy and content describing their experience at the salon as very calming and “earthy” which seems to fit perfectly with the image the salon wants to portray. “Coming to the salon to get my hair done is something I look forward to every visit. The staff is friendly and very attentive. They always get the job done no matter how long after closing time they have to stay.” says Brooke Myers, a salon regular for over two years now. “I’m an environmentalist and was ecstatic when I heard about what John was doing with the salon,” chimed in Rebecca Delaney. “It’s good to know that I’m doing something great for the earth while I’m doing something fun for myself.”For the most part, the clients love the idea. “They are all very supportive and think it’s great that there are more environmentally friendly options for them when it comes to their salon needs,” Esparza confessed.