Little Green Refills has become a firm favourite for the eco-friendly people in Monmouthshire and Newport. With the climate emergency being declared and the rise in awareness of the dangers of single-use plastics, shops like Little Green Refills are popping in quite a few towns.

The company is run by Ellen Hinton, 39, and Beth Oram, 43. Originally full-time mums, they decided to set the company up in April after wanting to go back to work but still needing to keep up with the demands of family life and matching their values and beliefs.

Ms Hinton said: “We wanted to do work that we could be proud of. We needed jobs but also wanted to feel we were making a difference in what feels like a point of crisis for the planet.”

While they have a base in Abergavenny Market where people can go to purchase cleaning and household products and refills, they also go a step further with a home or community point delivery service.

Ms Hinton added: “We were aware that there are many amazing refill shops popping up, but what about the people who can’t regularly get to the shops because of work or mobility issues or live rurally?

“We wanted to provide an alternative means of going plastic, cruelty and harsh chemical -free, to make this option more accessible to more people, hence our home deliveries, just like a milkman in glass bottles that we reuse.”

The popular delivery service may seem like a backwards step in terms of the planet, but the pair have thought about this and made a working plan that helps to reduce their carbon footprint.

They have a policy to group deliveries to each area and do the trip in one go, to minimise driving. They also have multiple community drop-off points across Gwent – where they can drop multiple orders off to these locations and then they can be picked up by people.

Little Green Refills stock two lines of products. Both of which are plant based, plastic free and cruelty free. The only difference is that the more expensive range is also organic.

Both women have the belief that buying ethical products should not be dependent on your income. They explained that most products that are organic or fair trade and are therefore more expensive.

Ms Hinton added: “In an ideal world, we would all be able to afford this but the truth is that only a minority can.

“If we are going to get our planet out of this mess then the majority of people need to be reducing their single use plastics.

“This is why we stock two lines of products, the higher price organic range but also a much more affordable range that is still amazing, still plastic free and cruelty free and all plant based.”

“We are hoping to continue to grow and receive support from the community. We currently have a market stall in Abergavenny that is wonderfully supported, and we have plans for more similar market refill stalls in other markets, with Pontypool next.

“We are continually expanding our delivery area, we now also deliver in Torfaen, Newport and are moving towards Cardiff and Bristol.

“In the future we would love to have our own shop and are working towards an electric delivery van.”

Despite not being six months old yet, Little Green Refills has cemented itself in the heart of the community and are finalists in the Monmouthshire Business Awards’ ‘Green’ category.