soulbottles made of stainless steel, produced in China & we are proud

Couldn't you...?

Georg and I founded soulbottles almost seven years ago and since then I have used my soulbottle every single day. Of course it is not exactly the same - I have given away my soulbottles far too often on trips and at events - but I am at the source and can easily get a new one.

For at home or on longer trips, I take a 1.0l soulbottle, which we were able to produce via crowdfunding in 2016 thanks to you.

But sometimes even I am not allowed to take my soulbottle with me, for example because certain sports locations prohibit glass altogether, and even when I attach the bottle to my backpack outside when climbing and it bumps against the rock the whole time, the whole thing was too unsafe for me.

So I looked around for stainless steel bottles. Unfortunately, many of them are not leak-proof and I usually don't like the design either. In addition, almost all stainless steel bottles are made in China and I wasn't entirely comfortable with this because I didn't find the production conditions particularly transparent.

So we thought about making a steel bottle ourselves that looks like our soulbottle. Same shape, same cap, cool designs – and the perfect companion on the rocks.

Production in Germany: 300€ per bottle?!

Since we mainly sell in Germany and Europe and always try to produce as regionally as possible, our search for manufacturers began here as well.
After telephone calls to over 50 companies in Germany, the result was: A lot of steel is produced and processed in Germany, but most companies are very specialized. For almost all manufacturers, our plan was too much work and there was generally almost no interest in "crazy new ideas." Yes, I know, a bottle, super crazy.

I got a few companies to the point where we at least worked it out. However, the production of the various parts of the soulbottle steel would have involved so many different stations that we would have had to transport a stainless steel bottle across the country. With production costs like that, we would have had to bring the soulbottle steel onto the market for around €300.

Of course this option would have been feasible, but we don't want to make products that no one can afford.

The other option would have been to buy all the machines and do it all ourselves. But that would have meant investing millions and that seemed too much even for you crowdfunding heroes.

A cross-border search...

We think that producing regionally makes sense because it means short distances with few emissions and we can easily visit our manufacturers. We also think that most of the working standards in Germany and Europe make sense. But I am also realistic and ultimately a pragmatist: Our soulbrushes are made from agave so that they are vegan. It grows in Mexico.
The natural rubber in our seals comes from fair production facilities in Sri Lanka , because the rubber tree does not grow so well in Germany.

After further research in Italy, Portugal, the UK and France, among other places, we eventually spoke to companies from China. I was very(!) skeptical at first, but then I saw through companies like Shift Phones and Hydrophil that sustainable production is also possible in China (as you can read, for example, in the very good article by Lina from Loveco).

I then flew to China ( CO2 offset with PrimaKlima ) and visited factories. I learned that "Made in China" is not always the same. There are very small companies that pay little attention to safety and working conditions, where there are sometimes no windows and people work overtime every day. Environmental regulations, e.g. regarding water and emissions, are not the same in all regions.

Of all the companies I visited, I had a particularly good feeling about one. It was a medium-sized family business with around 150 employees that places great value on fair pay for workers.
However, there was still plenty of room for improvement in the areas of working conditions and environmental protection measures. For example, stricter compliance with protective measures such as safety shoes and hearing protection.

The most important thing for me, however, was that I saw the willingness to work continuously on these issues and to work with us to make improvements. And our manufacturer is really keen on that. We have set goals together and are now tackling one project after the other.

Yes, and how do the soulbottles get to us?

All that remained was the transport to be sorted out. It is, after all, 8,500 km as the crow flies.

To transport products from China to Germany, you can use ships, trucks, planes or trains. We quickly ruled out air transport by plane and land transport by truck, as they generate a lot of CO2. That's why we decided to transport the soulbottles to Germany by train for the first delivery, which would be as resource-efficient as possible. The distance by train is around 10,800 km and fully loaded trains perform relatively well in terms of their ecological footprint. According to DB Schenker, 270 kg of CO2 emissions are generated per tonne transported.

For the transport of the first production this means:

4,500 bottles of 0.488 kg each = 2.196 t = 593 kg CO2

...so less than a round trip flight from Cologne/Bonn to Palma de Mallorca (0.7t). We calculate the exact total CO2 emissions from transport and also from the entire production and offset them with our partner myclimate . Due to the corona pandemic from 2020 onwards, it became really difficult for us to continue using this transport method and we temporarily switched to transport by ship. You can find more information about this in the blog article about the soulbottle steel utopia.

“the finish” or: how do we label the new soulmate?

The closure is the same as before – porcelain, stainless steel wire and natural rubber, all made in Germany. When the soulbottles steel arrive, they are checked and assembled once again. The correct answer would be

Designed in Berlin.
Partly made in Germany.
Partly made in China.
Assembled in Berlin.

We could have simply made it "Made in Germany" because the final production is done here . Some manufacturers do that too ( eg Alfi ), but for us, as much transparency as possible is the better way.

the Chinese government, weighing up the possibilities and "going" for production

There are many things the Chinese government does that do not correspond to my values ​​at all, such as the way it deals with Tibet, freedom of speech or surveillance. Is that a sufficient reason not to work with a company from that country?

I find that an extremely difficult question and I think there are legitimate arguments for both sides. What convinced me in the end was the balance between more or less suffering and the impact that we can ultimately achieve.

The share that we pay to the Chinese state in taxes and customs duties is significantly smaller than what we pay to the people there. We help people by giving them a job and by improving the prevailing working conditions bit by bit. We are also creating another drinking bottle, which we manufacture in the most resource-efficient and transparent way possible. That outweighs the disadvantages for me. And of course, by producing in China, we now have the opportunity to actively engage in exchange and make our contribution locally.

If you see it differently and don't feel comfortable buying the soulbottles steel, then don't do it. It is and remains your voluntary purchase decision. And of course there is still the soulbottle made of glass, made in Germany.

I see our new product as part of the change: behavioral change, sustainable living and saving plastic, transparency in production, intercultural exchange and better working conditions around the world.

And of course a new climbing companion :)

If you have feedback or suggestions for improvement, write to hello@soulbottles.com