35. Seep – purging the plastics around your kitchen sink

Founder: Laura Harnett
Year founded: 2020
Website: theseepcompany.com

We’ve come a long way in understanding the impact of plastics on the environment, but the planet and our households are still choked with products that are unnecessarily plastic-based.

Seep wants to play its part in changing this, and the UK startup has its eyes set on a winnable corner of the plastic-fightback – your kitchen sink, and the draining board next to it.

Sponges, scrubbing brushes, microfibre towels…you name it, it has plastic in it. Laura Harnett, founder of Seep, has had enough.

“Seep was born out of this frustration to find better household products after lots of trips to the supermarket,” Harnett tells us. “Over the years, I was finding it easier to find greener alternatives – cleaning sprays, toilet paper, washing detergent. But, when it came to the most unsexy categories in the cleaning aisle (yes, I’m looking at you sponges, cloths, bin liners), it was a sea of plastic with very few, easy-to-find, well-branded, effective, genuinely sustainable options.”

Even though some plastics can be recycled, many can’t be, and that includes cleaning products. And that’s before you consider the impact on your health. “The microplastics that come off products like cloths and sponges get left behind in our homes and in the oceans,” Hartnett explains. “The link between microplastics and human health is increasingly clear.”

Seeking to tackle these issues, Hartnett launched Seep, which has since built up its product range to include plastic-free sponges, scourers, rubber gloves and wash cloths. There’s been a real buzz around the business, which has been featured in Wired, the Guardian and the Financial Times, as well as in previous Startups 100 listings.

The business has seen some tremendous leaps forward since its inception in 2020. In the past year, it’s played with pricing strategies, creating lower priced products and smaller pack sizes, so that independent retailers could more easily meet minimum orders and create more impactful packaging for their shelves. 

As for the bigger retailers? It’s a who’s who of shelves any business would dream of seeing their product line on, including Ocado, Lakeland, Planet Organic and Whole Foods. In 2024, Seep was accepted onto the Tesco Accelerator so you’ll be seeing the brand in Tesco stores imminently.

We believe Seep is a business with a bright future ahead, as households look to limit their plastic usage and make small steps that can have a big environmental impact.