Sustainable Hygiene
for communities in need
Soap with a mission.
Sundara recycles old hotel soap into new bars, giving them a second life. We hire local women to do this work, lifting them from poverty with fair wage livelihoods, and they distribute the soap to their communities while providing free hygiene education classes for vulnerable populations.
'Sundara' comes from the Sanskrit word beautiful.
We believe that real beauty is what you give and teach to others.
The Problem.
Every year, 2 million children die of diseases - like diarrhea and pneumonia - that can be prevented by regular hand washing. Soap, the most basic form of medicine, unfortunately isn’t available to many of the world’s poorest.
At the same time, the hospitality industry throws away billions of bars of gently used soap into landfills every single year.
The
Solution.
Soap - combined with hand washing education - is the most cost-effective health intervention available today.
Watch how we make our soap here.
Did you know?
Children under 5 who wash with soap can prevent
pneumonia infection by 46%.
A $3.35 investment in hand washing brings the same benefits as an $11 investment in toilet construction, a $200 investment in water initiatives, and an investment of thousands of dollars in immunization. (Unicef)
Poor hygiene is responsible for 1 out of every 9 child deaths – that’s more than AIDS, measles and malaria combined.
Unilever estimates that there are 70 million people in India alone who have never used soap.
Our Impact
Through recycling soap, we’ve rescued thousands of kilograms of waste from ending up in overcrowded landfills – but more importantly we’ve brought soap to those who couldn’t afford it, given economic opportunity to unemployed women and seen increased rates of hand washing in all the communities we work in.
WASTE SAVED
154,602 kg
SOAP MADE
852,300
LESSONS
9,195
SERVED
122
REACHED
201,200
IMPACTED
880,101
Our Approach
Sundara takes old soap bars that would have otherwise been tossed into landfills, and recycles them into new, hygienic bars of soap that are pathogen free and can not transmit disease. We incorporate community empowerment, female leadership and hygiene education in the process.
Our Story
Our story begins in 2013 in a small village on the Thai-Myanmar border when our founder, Erin, met a group of school children who didn’t know what soap was.
Our Ambassadors
Sundara is proud to hire and empower women from underprivileged backgrounds who lack formal education. We offer them fair wage salaries, a safe place to work, and health insurance.
"This job allows me to care for my family and
improve my community. I feel proud"
MADHURI
Sundara Hygiene Ambassador