A Sustainable Alternative: Bamboo

About a year ago, we made the switch from store-bought toilet paper to an eco-friendly alternative—bamboo toilet paper and tissues from the Australian-based company Who Give a Crap. (Read a little more about them here!)

Since then, we’ve also purchased bamboo napkins for our dinner table (we have cloth napkins too, but with kiddos around, you can never have too many!), bamboo coffee filters, and bamboo (and charcoal) dental floss (pictured below). And recently, at an eco-friendly store we visited in Sparta, TN, I was pleasantly surprised to find an entire bamboo display—with cotton swabs, floss, and bamboo toothbrushes.

Bamboo display at the Farmer's Storehouse in Sparta, TN.

So what’s the deal with this big push toward bamboo? That’s what I wanted to know too.

Why Bamboo?

According to the Institution of Civil Engineers, which is touting bamboo as a “sustainable building material” for future projects, bamboo is preferred for several reasons:

• It’s quick growth.

• It’s resiliency.

• It’s ability to reduce the global carbon footprint.[i]

Other resources concur, revealing that “bamboo is one of the fastest-growing plants on earth.”[ii]

Inspired by this, one couple—Roger and Gayle Lewis—started a company (aptly titled Lewis Bamboo) that has sold more than 250,000 bamboo plants since opening. Their farm in Oakman, AL, is open to tours through their “bamboo groves.” Here is what they have to say about bamboo:

Planting bamboo is one of the best ways to help our environment. Bamboo is a crucial element in the balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A grove of bamboo release 35% more oxygen than an equivalent stand of trees. Because of this, planting bamboo is a great way to reduce your carbon footprint and help fight global warming.[iii]

And regarding its strength, I was surprised to discover that “bamboo is stronger than steel in regards to the tensile strength.” (Tensile strength refers to how much a material can be stretched or pulled before it breaks.)[iv] This explains why bamboo makes a great cutting board and why it's even being used to build houses (see, for example, the range of models provided by Bamboo Living). 

The other impressive characteristic that the Institution of Civil Engineers left off their list is bamboo’s natural antimicrobial ability. A scientific study published in the academic journal Antibiotics reveals:

Bamboo . . . is able to withstand the rough conditions posed by its environment, such as resistance to degradation by microorganisms, due to notable antibacterial characteristics.[v]

Because of this, bamboo requires ZERO pesticides to grow (“thank you!” says your wallet and the uncontaminated soil/ground water).

Also, because of this, bamboo is being studied with the hopes of translating its amazing antibacterial ability into antibacterial “products such as laminates and textile fabrics.”[vi]

Fast-growing, carbon-reducing, strong, and naturally antibacterial. I think it’s clear why bamboo is becoming a winner in many people’s (green-jacketed) books.

What Kinds of Bamboo Products Can You Buy?

So given that bamboo is a great eco-friendly alternative to popular (often plastic) products on the market, it’d be helpful to know what kinds of goods you can replace. Here’s a few quick lists:   

We tried these bamboo dental floss picks. They are slightly less durable than plastic (break easily), but they get the job done (floss is meant to be used once anyway), and they're 100% biodegradable!

Consumables

• Toilet paper

• Tissues

• Dental floss

• Paper towels

• Napkins

• Coffee filters

• Copy paper

• Disposable cups, plates, and cutlery

• Bandages

Reusables

• Cutting boards

• Utensils

• Dish brushes

• Toothbrushes

• Hairbrushes and combs

• Straws

• Fabrics and clothing

• Towels

• Sheets

  
  

One-and-Done Purchases

• Flooring

• Furniture

  
  

To explore a wide range of bamboo products, check out Seek Bamboo, a Miami-based company aiming to “leave a positive imprint on the environment.”[vii] And if you prefer to keep shopping in familiar places like Amazon, simply search for a bamboo alternative to your product before hitting Add to Cart.

A Word About Cost

If you start shopping for bamboo products, I want you to know upfront that you will notice a price increase. For the most part, plastic is cheaper to produce en masse and, thus, cheaper for consumers to buy.

But can I encourage you to take the long view and consider the cost of plastic on the back end?

According to an article posted by the National Library of Medicine,

Most plastics are not naturally degradable, and these non-renewable resources have increasingly expanded from land to sea, posing a huge threat to the environment and human health. . . . Therefore, eco-friendly alternative materials for plastic are needed to solve these problems.[viii]

Here’s why this matters: when you’re finished with a plastic product, it will sit in a landfill, requiring “anywhere from 20 to 500 years” to break down[ix], and when it finally does, it will have leaked microplastics into the soil and contaminated the groundwater.

(You may not have to deal with this issue as much as your grandchildren will.)

On the other hand, bamboo can fully biodegrade in months, and because it’s a natural product, it will decompose and nourish the soil—not damage it.

And if you’re needing more reasons to choose bamboo over plastic, how about these?

• Bamboo is a safer choice because of its naturally antimicrobial properties.

• Bamboo has a longer lifespan and will not need to be as frequently replaced.

  
  

You may pay a little more upfront, but a cost-benefit analysis seems to reveal a clear winner.

Here’s my word of encouragement: start small. Try replacing one product in your home—something already on your shopping list—with its bamboo cousin. When you run out of something else, then replace one more thing. Don’t just rush out and buy every bamboo product on the market!

Start small, but start somewhere. We make positive changes for God’s Earth and for those with whom we share it with each small step.💛

---

Notes

[i] “Building with Bamboo: A Sustainable Solution for the Future,” Institution of Civil Engineers, April 17, 2025, www.ice.org.uk/news-views-insights/inside-infrastructure/building-with-bamboo.

[ii] “How Bamboo Grows,” Lewis Bamboo, accessed July 9, 2026, lewisbamboo.com/pages/how-bamboo-grows?srsltid=AfmBOopVvnMcBxaCsxbcdsKstn_H8gW11eVJ7Jv8oK7YTJjZ5U9CsVxO#.

[iii] “Why Bamboo? (Green Solution), Lewis Bamboo, accessed July 9, 2026, lewisbamboo.com/pages/why-bamboo-green-solution.

[iv] Kashyap Vyas, “Bamboo as a Replacement to Steel,” Interesting Engineering, January 11, 2020, interestingengineering.com/innovation/bamboo-as-a-replacement-to-steel.

[v] Raviduth Ramful et al., “Investigating the Antibacterial Characteristics of Japanese Bamboo,” Antibiotics 11, no. 5 (2022): 569, doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics11050569.

[vi] Ramful et al., “Investigating the Antibacterial Characteristics of Japanese Bamboo.”

[vii] “Sustainable Living Starts Here,” Seek Bamboo, accessed July 9, 2026, seekbamboo.com/pages/about-us.

[viii] Dandan Xu et al., “Replacing Plastic with Bamboo: A Review of the Properties and Green Applications of Bamboo-Fiber-Reinforced Polymer Composites,” Polymers 15, no. 21 (October 2023): 4276, doi.org/10.3390/polym15214276.

[ix] “How Long Does It Take for Plastic to Decompose?” Green Living (blog), Chariot Energy, February 13, 2024, chariotenergy.com/blog/how-long-until-plastic-decomposes/.