Why Our $79 a Year Membership Is Worth It
We’re here to show exactly what you get from being a Public Goods member, as well as how that $79 positively impacts the planet and helps people in need.
We’ll also share some tips on how to cover the cost of your membership and budget effectively.
What You Get
Before we get into how your membership enables us to better steward the planet, let’s start with brass tacks. What benefits do you receive as a customer?
Premium Products, Delivered Conveniently and With Free Shipping on Orders $45+
With most e-commerce companies, you have to prioritize a few of the below values and compromise on the rest. You can’t have it all.
- quality products
- wide selection of products
- reasonable prices
- fast and affordable shipping
- sustainable ingredients and packaging
- beautiful design that compliments your home
Take Amazon. They’re great at numbers two, three and four, but severely lacking in the other areas.
At Public Goods we invest that $79 so our members can have it all. Our products are high-quality and ethically sourced, so you can shop guilt-free.
If it seems too good to be true, check out these profiles on a few of our manufacturers:
- Behind the Product: How Public Goods Bar Soap Is Made
- The Otomí People: Meeting the Makers of Our Ayate Washcloths
- The Story Behind Public Goods’ Shampoo Bar
We have close relationships with our factory managers. To ensure an excellent standard of quality, we hire companies to audit many of our products that ship from overseas.
Because we cut out the distributor and retail steps of the traditional supply chain, our products have minimal markups. You’re paying for the manufacturing and our brand. That’s it.
The membership revenue allows us to further lower these prices. Unlike most brands, we don’t depend entirely on product sales.
To provide more savings to our members, we sell refills for many of our most popular products. For example, for $2.50 you can buy a glass and metal container of silk dental floss that comes with one spool. Save the container. Then save big in the long-term by repeatedly purchasing our $5.50 refill pack of three spools.
You won’t have to worry about shipping costs either. To qualify for free shipping, fill your cart with $45 or more. It’s actually easy to hit the $45 threshold if you buy everything you need in one order, or if you buy for multiple people.
Even when I only buy for myself, I always pass $45 by periodically stocking up on essentials. Thanks to Public Goods, it’s been years since I’ve paid for shipping on my household products, and I’ve spent way less than a Prime membership.
Everything You Love About Direct-to-Consumer Brands and Private Label Stores, All in One Place and Shipped to Your Door
Remember that second factor we listed above, “wide selection of products”? That aspect touches on a personal consumer conundrum that gave me an appreciation for our brand and membership.
As my wife and I moved into our first home together, I realized that I cared about buying healthy, premium, sustainable and ethical products that would look good in their surroundings. Trader Joe’s carried a lot of the food products I wanted, but I didn’t have time to stand in lines that wrapped around every aisle. The lines at Whole Foods were shorter, but their prices were too high for me. Walgreens was convenient and affordable, but many of their products had unhealthy ingredients and were too ugly to leave out in our home.
Unfortunately I didn’t have much better luck online, not at first. I noticed there was a trend of direct-to-consumer/private label online brands that boasted high quality and reliable shipping. The problem was these companies only sold one product.
I hated the prospect of creating an account for each product I was interested in. What I really wanted was one account where I could buy everything with the private label quality of Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods, but shipped to my door (and maybe a little lower than Whole Foods prices).
Just as I was about to give up and feel like I was asking for too much, I stumbled upon Public Goods. Now I buy almost all of my household goods from PG, and I’m happy to be a member.
Free Product and Bundle Giveaways
We regularly offer perks to our members via email, like free goods and money off your order. Keep an eye out for good deals!
Access to Our Library of Free E-Books and Guides
Once you’re a member, you may email me at any time and request our library of free e-books and guides. Here are a few of the topics we cover:
- living a sustainable lifestyle
- unhealthy ingredients to watch out for
- self-care and mental health
- recipes and fun DIY projects
- recommendations for podcasts about sustainability
A Say in Our Product Development and Launch Priorities
When you become a Public Goods member, you also become an unofficial member of our product development team. Look out for the occasional survey on what products you want us to launch next.
You are also welcome to send our customer support team suggestions for new products. We’re listening, and we have a record of implementing customer recommendations. Dish soap refills, for example, were a popular request. Now you can buy them!
Excellent Customer Support
If you reach out to our customer support team, we will most likely be able to respond within the day. In fact, our average response time is below one hour. Now that’s fast service!
Our average customer effort score is usually 6.5 out of 7. To explain that scale, a 7 means people felt like our team made it as easy as possible to resolve their issue. A 6.5 average score shows that the vast majority of our members think our customer support team does a perfect job every time.
How You’re Helping Us Invest in Sustainability
To live up to our name, we take that $79 and invest in the public good. Here are some blog posts about our sustainability and humanitarian initiatives:
Why Public Goods Plants a Tree With Every Order
Each tree costs a little money, and we’ve already planted hundreds of thousands! Without our membership revenue, there’s no way we could afford these donations.
How We Are Trying to Make Our Box Packaging More Sustainable
Instead of filling our boxes with cheap plastic wrap, we spend extra on recycled cardboard and recycled paper filling.
Our Box Wrap Is Now Home Compostable
To prevent certain products from leaking in your box, we source wrapping material that can be composted at home or in industrial centers. This packaging costs more than typical plastic wrap that can’t be composted or recycled.
Are Sustainable Palm Oil Products Making a Difference?
The palm oil in our products is certified sustainable, and you have to pay for that certification.
Are Sugarcane-Based Plastics a Sustainable Alternative to Petroleum?
Sugarcane-based plastic is more expensive than petroleum plastic. The environmental benefit is that sugarcane fields absorb carbon dioxide instead of emitting it.
Charities and Nonprofits We Have Supported
- CHiPS
- Clean the World
- Community FoodBank of New Jersey
- Eden Reforestation Projects
- Feeding America
- Freedom House
- Jewish Community Center of San Francisco
- Miss Amazing
- ProjectQ
- Skid Row Carnival of Love
- St. Mary’s Food Bank
- The Bowery Mission
- The Homeless Period Project
- Welcome Home
- Widefield Elementary School
Blog Posts About Some of Our Charitable Initiatives
- 7K in 7 Days to These 7 Racial Justice Organizations
- I Found Out One of My Employees Was Donating to Homeless Shelters
- Why We Donated Travel-Size Toiletries to the Skid Row Carnival of Love
- Why We Donated Our Menstrual Care Products to Homeless Shelters
Budget Effectively: Cover the Cost of Your Membership
Before you decide $79 is too much money, think about some of the other recurring costs in your life. A basic Netflix subscription is $8.99 a month, about $108 a year. Our annual fee breaks down to less than $7 a month. You might already be spending $7 a day on your favorite latte.
Another difference is that Netflix doesn’t offer limitless ways to reduce that cost. If you don’t mind taking a little time to read our blog and spread the word about Public Goods, you could see that fee shrink to almost nothing.
How Can We Make the Membership Better?
During every quarterly meeting, we discuss how to improve our membership, and we won’t stop until all of our members are satisfied. Right now we are thinking of expanding our selection of member-only content, and soon we’ll be launching new categories such as pet food and CBD.
If you’re still not sold, we’d love to know what would change your mind. Please leave a comment below, send us a message on social media or reach out to our customer support team.
Download Our Free Guide to Sustainable Living.
From reducing waste to recycling and upcycling, our e-book shows simple ways to make choices you can feel good about.
