Dairy has plastic bottles in its sight

And Schulz Organic Dairy doesn’t like being a part of that, so has been working out a way to try and stop its involvement.

In recent months, the Timboon dairy has trialled using glass bottles to house its full cream milk at local farmers’ markets, and they’ve been selling out hot and fast.

But Schulz Organic Dairy founder Simon Schulz said the dairy wanted to do more to shift away from using plastic milk bottles, and reduce its environmental impact.

So it launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money to help the dairy purchase equipment needed to package more of its milk in returnable glass bottles.

And in just 20 days, the campaign has raised $68,000.

With just 10 days to go, the dairy hopes to raise a further $76,000 to reach its goal of $144,000.

And this goal is already triple the original goal set over two weeks ago, of just $48,000, that was reached a week ago.

Mr Schulz said that target would have enabled the dairy to invest in the equipment needed to produce 3000 glass bottles a week, saving six tonnes of plastic each year.

But the new target will allow for the production of up to 10,000 bottles a week, saving 20 tonnes of plastic each year.

He said the only option they can see that’s sustainable is glass bottles.

“They can be washed, returned, refilled and reused, time and time again,” he said.

“As a business we’ve been adding [plastic bottles to landfill], and that’s been keeping me up at night.”

He said if the crowdfunding campaign is successful, it will take the business one step closer to achieving its ultimate goal of finding a viable and sustainable way of bottling up its milk.

But he said it’s not all about Schulz Organic Dairy.

“We hope we can convince more in our industry to adopt glass by showing them how it can be done,” he said.

He said retailers are already on board.

“We’ve got a list of retailers on standby, they’re ready to come on this crazy, slightly logistically-challenged, but totally doable journey with us,” he said.

“They will be ranging our products as soon as we can bottle them.”

For more information, or to donate, click here.