Julia Traggorth ’05, who owns Four Corners Supply Co., a refill store, says her exposure to ecology-based learning at Lawrenceville was fostered by former Aldo Leopold Fellow Josh Hahn. “It shaped who I am,” she says.
Refilling a Need
By following a mission of low-waste living, Julia Traggorth ’05 creates high-impact connections through her refill store.
If you walk into Four Corners Supply Co. with an empty bourbon bottle, Julia (Merriman) Traggorth ’05 won’t inquire about your weekend with a raised eyebrow. She’ll just ask if you’d like the glass vessel filled with lavender laundry detergent or nontoxic dish soap. As the founder of this refill store, or “refillery,” as they are sometimes known, Traggorth deals in thoroughly vetted, eco-friendly retail items that are all sustainably sourced and reduce packaging and waste as much as possible, while carrying a promise of being earth-, plant-, and people-safe. It’s a business, but also an extension of her life.
“People ask me, how long have you been doing this?” she says. “I’ve always been doing this. I’ve just always been like this.”
Still, parlaying a passion into a small business comes with a learning curve, but as a former teacher, that is something Traggorth understood and was up for the challenge.
“My friends would always ask me for recommendations or say, ‘Hey, we know you’ve tried everything and wasted all the money, so can you just tell us what actually works?’” she explains with a laugh. “And so that made me think, Yeah, might as well try it.”
Traggorth began selling sustainable home products from a closet in her Massachusetts home in 2021, fulfilling online orders. Before long, she leased a space in the historic Four Corners section of Hanover, Mass., which lent its name to her business. She has since moved to a larger store a few miles away in Marshfield, on the South Shore.
Four Corners Supply Co. is one of about 1,300 refill stores in the United States, and one of just eighteen in Massachusetts. Though product lines vary by store and state — Traggorth is not permitted by law to sell food items, for instance — refillery staples include bulk products such as soaps and detergents and cleaning and kitchen supplies. Customers typically bring their own containers (which are not typically bourbon bottles, though they can be) into which Traggorth dispenses the amount of a product they will hold, with prices based on weight.
People ask me, how long have you been doing this? I’ve always been doing this. I’ve just always been like this.
Sunscreens, face and body lotions, household cleaners, and scented laundry powders and concentrates are just some of the bulk items for sale, but her store also sells reusable non-paper towels, a nifty garlic press and herb stripper, a stainless-steel lunchbox with compartments, and charming Duckhead umbrellas. Traggorth even carries a soothing organic Booty Balm, which is, well, exactly what it sounds like. Hey, diaper rash is no laughing matter.
The fun inventory of goods available at Four Corners Supply Co. can and does appeal to shoppers beyond devoted environmentalists or consumers trying to avoid exposure to chemicals. Many are drawn to its stripped-down simplicity.
“I do feel like a lot of people are looking for a more analog experience in a very overwhelming, saturated world,” Traggorth says. “So, it’s nice to have just highly curated things and less choices sometimes.” Not everyone is familiar with refilleries, and although she is loath to preach about the detriments of plastics — “that’s not a great way of getting people to change their habits,” Traggorth says — she starts slowly before yielding more and more information when explaining her catalogue, particularly
away from her shop. “The reactions are either like, Huh, that’s weird, or, Oh, cool,” she says. “Or, Oh, I’ve always wanted to do something like that! I’ll come by!”
Traggorth says those in the third group frequently become customers, and their subsequent spreading of the word accounts for a good part of her sales, 80 percent of which occur in store. She estimates that she sees a new face in Four Corners Supply Co. just about every day she’s open.
“Which is nice,” she adds.
That group, along with her far-flung peers who own similar establishments, has collectively engendered a sense of bonhomie and common purpose. Shop owners will refer their regular customers to stores in other areas if they’re traveling or even relocating. Traggorth recently heard from a refillery owner in New Hampshire who sells to a former customer who moved north.
“I told her that’s great — say ‘hi!’” she says.
That personal connection has been the most surprising aspect of her work.
“I wasn’t setting out to create a community,” says Traggorth, adding that Four Corners Supply Co. sponsors a local youth baseball team. “I was just really looking to create a retail store, and it has become this really wonderful, valuable community to me.”