2023 Impact Highlights 💪
Message from our Co-founders
2023 flew by…but what a year it’s been!
As always, we’re incredibly grateful to our community as we look back at the impact we’ve made together this year.
From collaborating with elementary schoolers in Okinawa, to launching collaborations with major brands and local governments, we’re seeing real, tangible change in communities across Japan thanks to your support.
To help you see how your support and action is contributing to change, we’re sharing just a handful of the amazing stories of impact from this past 12 months below.
On behalf of all of us at mymizu, thank you all for taking action with us this year. We’re looking forward to making an even bigger impact in 2024 with all of you!
- Robin & Mariko
Impact Stories
Here are a few stories from 2023 that capture the spirit of the mymizu movement and the impact we’ve all made, together.
Miyakojima Youth Collaboration
Collaborating with school children for a plastic-free Miyakojima
Partnering with youth group Miyakojima Leo Club and Miyakojima City office, we launched an initiative to increase refill spots across the beautiful island of Miyakojima in Okinawa. Driven by a desire to make their home more sustainable, the young leaders worked with the local community to increase the number of mymizu Refill Partners from 2 to 35, a big step towards a plastic-free island, for both residents and travellers! An incredible effort, showing us the power of youth to create change 👏
Earth Day 2023 @ Mount Takao Takeover
Engaging hikers in environmental issues at the world’s most hiked mountain!
On Earth Day (22nd April), we collaborated with Columbia Sportswear and took over Mt. Takao! Hundreds of people stopped by our activation space outside Takaosan-guchi station where we set up a free water station, a nature photography exhibition and eco-games for kids - we even held a mountain cleanup ⛰️🗑
Campus Changemakers Summit @ University of Tokyo
Bringing students together to co-create solutions to reduce waste
On 21st August, we co-hosted the “Campus Changemakers Summit” at the University of Tokyo! 30 students from across Japan gathered to accelerate sustainable transformations of school and university campuses, focusing on the theme of ‘waste reduction’. Participants pitched their projects, shared learnings, brainstormed new creative ideas, and developed new friendships.
Cleanup Collaborations
Inspiring connection and action
We joined forces with diverse partners to host fun and impactful cleanup events, including partnering with LUSH to organise a series of clean ups in Shinjuku (you would be shocked at the amount of trash collected…!), a beach cleanup with employees from Bloomberg and JP Morgan in Kanagawa, and collaborating with students from ASIJ to support a Shibuya cleanup too!
KIRIN Partnership
Designing a more sustainable future for beverages
2023 marks an important year for mymizu, in that we entered a ‘Business Innovation Partnership’ with The Kirin Holdings Company, Limited. Thank you to everyone who took the time to respond to the survey we launched in the autumn! Refilling water is just one step in what needs to be an industry-wide effort to reduce plastic consumption, and we are excited to leverage the power of the mymizu community to support one of KIRIN's new sustainability-related ventures and take a major step toward a New Age of Sustainable Hydration! 🤩
mymizu Hackathon
Bringing together engineers and designers to co-create impactful technology
We held our second mymizu Open Source Hackathon in March, co-hosted with our friends at Code Chrysalis. 17 software engineers (and a dog!) came together to work on the mymizu web app which we designed with pro bono support from TBWA\HAKUHODO to make mymizu’s network of refill spots accessible from your desktop or mobile browser. Read more about our open source community here.
Partnering with Local Governments
Supporting sustainable, circular communities
mymizu has continued to work with local governments to reduce plastic waste and increase access to drinking water - something that is becoming increasingly important with the hot summers and risk of heatstroke. For example, we’ve been working with both Fukui Prefecture and Itami City in Hyogo Prefecture, with more exciting news to come in 2024 related to local government partnerships… Watch this space!
Launching mymizu Local Heroes
Empowering volunteers across Japan to drive positive change
Since 2019, we have been overwhelmed by the offers of support from across Japan to grow the mymizu movement. That’s why we launched “mymizu Local Heroes”, an initiative to empower volunteers to take action in their local areas. We’re just getting started, but are grateful to those who have joined our online meet-ups, taken action, and contributed to the discussion so far! 💧
Building Community with Refill Partners
Helping stores and businesses take environmental action
We’re extremely proud and grateful that our mymizu network of stores has now reached 2,400! Our Refill Partners are truly at the core of mymizu’s movement, and this year, having received some helpful feedback, we developed new communications materials to support in-store promotion. We had several mymizu Refill Partners featured on national TV too!
Lectures, Workshops, and Public Talks
Sharing insights, facilitating discussions and encouraging co-creation
This year, we held 55 talks and workshops for 4,300+ people at companies, schools, and universities!
Companies include: Adobe, AIG, Bloomberg, LinkedIn, L’Oreal, Nissan, OSG Corporation, Ricoh Group, Volvo
Others include: Asia-Pacific University, ASEAN Conference, Asia Productivity Organisation,HEC Paris, ICC Summit, Keio University, NEXUS Japan, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST), Pomona University, Rikkyo University, Swarthmore College, Tokyo International School, United Nations (ITCILO), University of Tokyo.
Impact in Numbers
Since we launched:
1.5 million app sessions - each session representing a time that mymizu has helped someone to refill
230,000+ downloads of the free mymizu app, helping people reduce millions of plastic bottles across 50 countries
Grew our network of partner stores to 2,400+ across all 47 Prefectures of Japan and overseas
205,700+ crowdsourced Refill Spots in total, around the world (including 1200 contributions from mymizu app users in 2023, each translated and uploaded by a mymizu volunteer!)
10,000+ User-Generated Content (UGC) across Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube since 2019
In 2023:
Mobilised 100+ volunteers through Hackathons, Local Heroes, clean-up events, and other initiatives
Delivered 55 talks, seminars and workshops to 4,300+ people, including 1,800 youth
Media Highlights
In 2023, we had 70+ mentions of our work in media, including NHK World, TBS, Yomiuri TV, NIKKEI, National Geographic and the Apple App Store! You can see these and more via our Media page.
Our Supporters
Below are some of the amazing people and organisations who have supported our work in 2023 (listed in alphabetical order). Our huge gratitude and thanks to all those (including those not named below) who have supported our activities this year.
Strategic Partners
Grant Givers & Organisational Donors
Monthly Supporters
Many of mymizu’s community activities, including our Campus Changemakers Summit, support of young leaders in Miyakojima, Local Heroes program and event were made possible thanks to the donations of our Monthly Supporters! Some have preferred to stay anonymous (and so are not named below), but a HUGE thank you to the wonderful people who are contributing to support our activities to ensure a more sustainable world for all 💙
Buyna Tugsbaatar・Joseph Tame・Kengo Mizutani・Peter Kilner・Shizuka Y・Tanmay 💧・Valeriya・Yuto Hirota・Jane Best・BiAi Kano・LIAISON・Ashyrgeldi Atayev・Yutaka Sato・Satomi Alissa・おこ鯛アピタ名古屋南店・甲 守弘・栗林豊・木下博之・久保田啓介・レオクラブ宮古島・BiAi カノ・池田晴美・岡田浩一（順不同・敬称略）
Want to help us grow our impact?
For Individuals
Donate: Provide essential support to our platform and movement by becoming a Monthly Supporter (from 500 yen a month) or by giving a one-time donation. See the donate page for more!
Grow the mymizu network: Add public water refill spots via the app, or encourage your favourite cafe, shop or restaurant to become a partner store.
Join an Event: Connect with our community through one of our in-person or virtual events.
Share: Tell your friends about mymizu on social media, or leave a review on the app store. Check out our free graphics and materials which you can use to spread the word.
Buy a mymizu bottle: Show some love by carrying around a mymizu bottle wherever you go! (Deliveries in Japan only)
For Companies & Organisations
Donate: Provide essential support to our movement and platform by making a corporate donation or joining our brand alliance. See our donate page and partners page for more!
Order branded mymizu Bottles: Help your teams reduce plastic waste by ordering our customised bottles.
Request a speaker here, on topics such as sustainability, innovation, circular economy and the SDGs.
Share: Tell your employees about mymizu and encourage them to join the movement. Check out our free graphics and posters.
THANK YOU!