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Founder – Alexandra Tylee

For a while now I have become more and more alarmed about what is happening to our planet and about a year ago it reached a point where I felt I had to do something and that something has turned into Project Do Less.

One of the main issues we face is the sheer enormity of the climate change problem and the fact that the more you learn about it the more terrifying it becomes. And we think this leads to a kind of paralysis amongst a large percentage of the population.

So, the purpose of Project Do Less is to empower all people by reminding them all the small things they can do right now to contribute to the solution. For instance, shorter showers, eating less meat, reducing plastic, less time on mobile phones etc. – all things that will also save them money.

By getting individuals to promise to Do Less, no matter how small, it will help to make them feel less like a victim and more like they are part of the solution. We believe the more small things they do, the better they will feel about themselves and the climate change problem, and it will have a snowball effect.

The analogy we are using is that it’s like World War 2 when the people at home did a huge amount to help win the war. Instead of knitting socks, we are pulling out plugs and biking to work. We are not on the front line of the war on climate change like scientists, politicians or activists, but we can still make a huge difference.

Co-Founder – Georgina Miller

My DO LESS journey started with a phone call from Alexandra asking for a website. Her heartfelt vision was to create a movement to address the overwhelming feeling of powerlessness in the face of climate change – while at the same time making it feel like we were giving everyone a big hug.

I was skeptical. How on earth would we do that? Would people care enough? Where do we even start?

Almost a year later, we’re live in social media and I feel like her vision is starting to come to life (hugs and all), and I am so proud to be part of it. To be doing SOMETHING 💗

Climate change is real, it’s going to be a massive problem for us all, and I want to do something to help slow it down so I can look my kids (and hopefully grandkids) in the eye and say “I did what I could”.

We’ve been pretty big consumers of energy – big office, big house, big petrol SUVs, overseas travel every year, throwing stuff out when it stopped working and buying a new one etc – but it had started to feel really wrong.

Then over the past year or so we’ve made some big changes – moved home to work, we got rid of a car, replaced the SUV with a hybrid, and we’re using HBRC’s sustainable homes grant to install solar panels – and so we’ve started to feel a lot better.

But Project DO LESS is not only about making big changes. It’s actually more about making lots of little changes every day.

I spent the most glorious years of my childhood on a farm just outside of Whanganui where nothing was wasted. The scraps fed the pigs, the chooks laid our eggs, the manure fertilised our gardens, we ate what we grew, we wore hand-me-downs, we washed our plastic bags, we conserved water so the tank didn’t run out, the butter wrappers were saved for baking, and the meat fat for cooking. We made do with what we had. We were thrifty. Everyone was.

And somewhere along the way we forgot about all of that. But now, more than ever, we need to remember.

I don’t think Project DO LESS is trying to do anything unique, I think it’s simply a return to our wise old ways and I’d love you to join us on this journey 🥰