Plastic Bank

Plastic Bank is a certified, blockchain-traceable plastic recovery organisation helping prevent ocean-bound plastic from reaching the ocean. They operate in coastal communities - the areas responsible for the majority of ocean plastic - where collectors are paid fair wages to gather, log, and hand over plastic before it enters the sea.

Every collection is independently audited and logged on a blockchain, creating a permanent, tamper-proof record. When a number appears on your packaging or report, it traces back to a specific collection, in a specific location, on a specific date.

Using advanced technologies to intercept plastic from rivers before it reaches the ocean, and to extract plastic already floating in ocean gyres.

The Ocean Cleanup

The Ocean Cleanup deploys advanced technologies to remove plastic from oceans and rivers at scale. They target both the source - rivers that carry plastic to the sea - and the accumulation zones where plastic gathers in ocean gyres.

Their work is complementary to Plastic Bank's - while Plastic Bank intercepts plastic before it reaches the ocean, The Ocean Cleanup tackles what's already there. Together they represent a comprehensive approach to the problem.

In 2023, I travelled to Thailand with two of my best friends. We grew up on the south coast of England, where a Christmas Day swim has always been one of those ridiculous traditions we loved. Freezing cold water, questionable decisions, but it had to be done.

So when we found ourselves on a beach in Thailand on Christmas morning, we were pretty excited. For once, our Christmas Day swim was going to be warm. Blue water, sunshine, soft sand - the version you spend most of the year imagining when you're stuck at your desk.

It didn't quite turn out like that.

The sun was shining, and from a distance the beach looked beautiful. But once we got closer, it was hard to ignore how much plastic was there. Some of it was obvious: bottles, wrappers, bits of packaging. Some of it was much smaller. Tiny pieces in the sand and water. When we got in for a swim, plastic floated past us. You could feel small pieces brushing against your skin and even had small microplastics in my hair when I got out.

These are the beaches people dream about visiting. The kind of places you picture when you think of paradise. But up close, parts of it felt broken.

At first, we did a couple of beach cleans, but three British guys picking plastic from a stretch of beach wasn't enough. We donated to a local clean-up charity but this also didn't feel like it was going to make a difference.

When we got home, we started looking for a better way to help people and businesses fund ocean-bound plastic removal. We did a few "please donate" posts on social media, but most people are broke, frugal or simply weren't invested enough in solving the problem.

I got one post that got 400 likes... but only 14 of them had donated. We quickly realised that people would probably opt in to removing plastic, if it was free.

So we launched OceanClean App.

OceanClean App lets people remove ocean-bound plastic every day, for free, by watching one 20-second sponsored advert on their phone. The idea was simple: brands are willing to pay for consumer attention. People want to do something useful but don't want to pay. OceanClean App connects the two.

A brand pays to reach people. The user watches the ad. The money goes directly to ocean clean-up organisations. No donation required. No complicated process. Just a small daily action that helps fund something tangible.

After launching the app, we started speaking to brands that wanted to do more than just advertise. One of those was Buci, one of our first app advertisers. After speaking with their founders, they decided to connect their product sales directly to ocean plastic removal. For every can of kombucha they sell, they fund the removal of ocean-bound plastic.

They want to clean the ocean, but they also want people to know that they care. Just like with OceanClean App, they win because they can promote themselves as a brand that cares, reaching a new audience of conscious consumers.

We are not pretending The Ocean Clean Group is going to solve ocean plastic on its own.

But we do believe that if more businesses use their reach, customers, products, packaging, and platforms to fund plastic removal, the impact can become much bigger than anything we could do alone.

What started as a disappointing Christmas Day swim in Thailand has now become a business that has already helped fund the removal of millions of microplastics from the environment, funded entirely by businesses around the world.

The goal is simple: to help remove as much ocean-bound plastic as we can - until one day, going for a swim in a beautiful place doesn't mean coming out with plastic in your hair.