Convince your parents: 12 conversation cards

How to use these cards

• Twelve conversation cards for children aged about 8 to 14 to use at home. Each card has: the thing you can say (a claim you can back up), the evidence in one sentence with its source, a "what if they say…" reply, and a family action to suggest.
• Print them A6 (four to an A4 sheet), or swipe through them on a phone. Pick one a week. The tone is curious, not preachy: you are asking your family to try something, not telling them off.
• Made and funded by No Plastic Today. Licence: CC BY 4.0. Every fact has been checked against the original source; we have deliberately left out popular "facts" that do not hold up when you check the original research (the credit-card-a-week one, the "450 years" one, the "more plastic than fish" one). Our evidence pages explain why each one is wrong.

Card 1 — Shopping: the big bag of rice

• You can say: "Can we buy the big bag instead of lots of little packets? It's usually cheaper per kilo and it's a lot less plastic."
• Evidence: A crisp or snack packet weighs about 5.4 g of plastic, so ten small packets a week is about 2.8 kg of plastic a year from one snack (European Commission single-use plastics study, 2018, Table A2.1: ec.europa.eu/environment/pdf/waste/Study_sups.pdf).
• If they say "the little ones are handy for lunchboxes": "We could fill a small tub from the big bag on Sunday. I'll do it."
• Family action: pick one snack to buy in a large size this week and decant it into tubs.

Card 2 — Shopping: the bag for life that actually lives

• You can say: "Scientists worked out a bag for life only has a smaller climate impact than a thin bag if we use it at least 4 times, and a cotton bag needs 131 uses, because growing and making cotton has a big climate cost. So the trick isn't buying bags, it's remembering them."
• Evidence: UK Environment Agency, Life Cycle Assessment of Supermarket Carrier Bags, 2011, executive summary (biodeg.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/uk-ea-publishes-lca-of-supermarket-carrier-bags-.pdf).
• If they say "we always forget them": "Let's keep two in the car door and one folded in your coat pocket. I'll put them there now."
• Family action: put reusable bags where you will actually find them, and count how many single-use bags you take next month. Aim for zero.

Card 3 — Shopping: it worked in England

• You can say: "Small charges really work. In England, shops charged 10p a bag and bag use dropped 81% in ten years. Our house can do the same thing with a jar: 10p in the jar every time we take a new bag."
• Evidence: 399 million single-use bags were sold by large retailers in England in 2025–26, down 81% since 2016 and down from 7.6 billion in 2014 (UK Government carrier bag charge data: gov.uk/government/publications/carrier-bag-charge-summary-of-data-in-england/single-use-plastic-carrier-bags-charge-data-for-england-2025-to-2026).
• If they say "10p is nothing": "It isn't about the money, it's about noticing. That's why it worked."
• Family action: start a "new-bag jar" for one month and spend the money on something the family chooses.

Card 4 — Kitchen: the refill bottle

• You can say: "If I take a refill bottle to school every day instead of a bought bottle, that's about 190 bottles a year that never get made. Around the world, only about 9% of plastic waste gets recycled, so not using a bottle at all is the bit that counts."
• Evidence: About 9% of plastic waste was recycled worldwide in 2019 (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Global Plastics Outlook, 2022: oecd.org/en/about/news/press-releases/2022/06/global-plastic-waste-set-to-almost-triple-by-2060.html).
• If they say "tap water tastes funny": "Let's try a jug in the fridge; cold tap water tastes different. Or a cheap filter jug."
• Family action: buy one refill bottle each (or dig out the ones you already own) and put them by the front door.

Card 5 — Kitchen: the tap wins

• You can say: "Around the world, people buy about a million plastic bottles every minute. Tap water is hundreds of times cheaper and it comes out of the wall."
• Evidence: About one million plastic bottles were bought per minute in 2016, according to Euromonitor market research reported by The Guardian (theguardian.com/environment/2017/jun/28/a-million-a-minute-worlds-plastic-bottle-binge-as-dangerous-as-climate-change). The number is a few years old, but the point stands. In one Australian council area, 1,000 litres of tap water costs about 4 Australian dollars, while one 600 millilitre bottle of water in a shop costs about 3.25 Australian dollars (Tweed Shire Council, New South Wales: tweed.nsw.gov.au/property-rates/water-wastewater/water-supply-assets/choose-tap).
• If they say "we like fizzy water": "A soda maker pays for itself, and the gas canisters get swapped, not thrown away."
• Family action: for one week, count every drink bottle that comes into the house. Then pick one type to stop buying.

Card 6 — Kitchen: wrap it in something we already have

• You can say: "Could we use a box or a beeswax wrap instead of cling film for my sandwich? Most councils won't take cling film in the recycling bin."
• Evidence: Of all the plastic ever made up to 2015, only 9% was recycled and 79% ended up in landfill or the environment (Geyer, Jambeck and Law, Science Advances, 2017: doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1700782). Most UK councils do not take cling film in home recycling, so it goes in the rubbish bin (Wales Recycles: walesrecycles.org.uk/recycle-an-item/cling-film).
• If they say "boxes leak": "I'll find one with a clip lid. I'll wash it too."
• Family action: put the cling film at the back of the drawer for a fortnight and see whether anyone misses it.

Card 7 — Bathroom: the bamboo toothbrush test

• You can say: "We each throw away about four toothbrushes a year, and each one is about 18 g of plastic. A bamboo one works the same. Can we try one when the next brush wears out?"
• Evidence: Toothbrush weight about 14–18 g (Plastic Pollution Coalition fact card; measuringly.com/how-much-does-toothbrush-weigh/); four per person per year is the usual dental advice.
• If they say "bamboo goes mouldy": "You stand it up to dry, like a wooden spoon. And the bristles are the only plastic bit."
• Family action: replace one family member's brush with bamboo at the next change and compare after three months.

Card 8 — Bathroom: many wipes contain plastic

• You can say: "Lots of wet wipes are made with plastic. In the UK, about 31 billion were sold in 2021, and the government thinks a quarter to a half of them contained plastic. Flushing them blocks drains and they end up on beaches. Can we use a flannel or washable cloths at home?"
• Evidence: UK Government evidence for the ban on wet wipes containing plastic (gov.uk/guidance/single-use-plastics-bans-and-restrictions); Scottish Government (gov.scot/news/wet-wipes-containing-plastic-to-be-banned/); sales and plastic share from the Scottish Government impact assessment (gov.scot/publications/ban-supply-sale-wet-wipes-containing-plastic-final-business-regulatory-impact-assessment/pages/3/).
• If they say "we need them for the baby / when we're out": "Keep those for out-and-about, and use cloths at home. That's still most of them gone."
• Family action: keep a stack of small cloths by the sink for one month and see how many packets you do not buy.

Card 9 — Lunchbox: the swap that saves the most

• You can say: "I counted my lunchbox for a week at school. The biggest thing by weight wasn't the straws, it was the drink bottle. Swapping the one big thing does more than swapping five tiny things."
• Evidence: A drinks bottle is about 10 g of plastic, a straw only 0.4 g and a crisp packet 5.4 g (European Commission single-use plastics study, 2018, Table A2.1: ec.europa.eu/environment/pdf/waste/Study_sups.pdf).
• If they say "you need a drink at lunch": "Yes, in a refill bottle. Same drink, no bottle."
• Family action: do the Classroom Plastic Audit at home for one week, then choose the heaviest item to swap.

Card 10 — Parties: the balloon question

• You can say: "Can we skip balloons and plastic party bags this year? Balloons and their strings end up in rivers and the sea, and lots of animals mistake them for food."
• Evidence: 914 species of sea animal have been recorded with plastic inside them or tangled in it (Kühn and van Franeker, Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2020: doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2019.110858). The EU has banned single-use plastic balloon sticks, cutlery, plates and straws since 2021 (Directive 2019/904: eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2019/904/oj).
• If they say "kids expect party bags": "Give one good thing instead of a bag of small plastic things: a book, seeds, a cinema ticket. Or bunting and paper decorations we reuse every year."
• Family action: plan the next birthday with a "no balloons, one good gift" rule and see if anyone notices.

Card 11 — School run: it's mostly the small rivers

• You can say: "Rubbish dropped in our town doesn't stay here. More than a thousand rivers carry most of the plastic that reaches the sea, and most of them are small ones running through towns like ours. So picking up litter near our stream actually matters."
• Evidence: More than 1,000 rivers account for 80% of river plastic emissions to the ocean; small urban rivers dominate (Meijer and others, Science Advances, 2021: doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aaz5803).
• If they say "one person can't make a difference": "Then let's do it with three families. Ten minutes on a Saturday."
• Family action: join or start a ten-minute litter pick near the nearest stream, river or drain once a month. Count what you find.

Card 12 — The big picture: it is fixable

• You can say: "This isn't hopeless. The United Nations worked out that using things again, recycling properly and swapping materials could cut plastic pollution by 80% by 2040 with things that already exist. Our family can be part of the 'reuse' bit right now."
• Evidence: UN Environment Programme (UNEP), Turning off the Tap, 2023: reuse alone contributes a 30% cut, recycling 20%, substitution 17% (unep.org/resources/turning-off-tap-end-plastic-pollution-create-circular-economy).
• If they say "the big companies should fix it": "They should, and brand audits show 56 companies make more than half of branded plastic litter (Cowger and others, Science Advances, 2024: doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adj8275). We can do our bit and ask them to do theirs. Want to write to one with me?"
• Family action: choose the three swaps from these cards that were easiest, and sign the 30-day Swap Challenge together.