A refill shop founded by a chartered accountant who wanted to help people reduce waste has recorded a surge in sales after moving into home delivery amid the coronavirus lockdown.
Love Your Planet has seen demand for essentials such as pasta, rice and flour surge as people have taken to cooking and baking more while staying at home.
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The shop, which is based in the Dundee suburb of Broughty Ferry, has also seen sales of hand sanitiser and water-based Dew disinfectant rocket.
The founder of the business, Debbie Gallacher, said she had made huge changes in response to the challenges posed by the coronavirus.
“When lockdown was announced, we had to think about how we could make it easier for people isolating to buy,” said Ms Gallacher.
She added: “We quickly introduced an online delivery service which has proved very popular across Tayside.”
Ms Gallacher’s daughter, Caragh, operates the delivery service after being made redundant from her job as a call centre worker.
Goods are supplied in plastic free packaging.
Love Your Planet has also started offering a click and collect service.
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The business introduced a three-person limit and provided additional hand sanitiser stations at its store, where people can fill up their own containers with products stocked in 75 dispensers.
Ms Gallacher made the changes after taking advice from her local Business Gateway service, which helped her develop a new website to support the new ways of working.
She said: “My Business Gateway adviser, Stuart, has been a constant source of knowledge and inspiration, encouraging me to go beyond my comfort zone and adapt my business model.”
Ms Gallacher opened Love Your Planet in September after spending eight years working for chartered accountants MHA Henderson Loggie.
Love Your Planet has seen sales increase by 22 per cent overall on the preceding quarter since March.
Sales of Dew disinfectant and hand sanitisers have increased by 253%. Sales of dry goods such as pasta have risen 68%.
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