A mobile shop frequently seen at farmer’s markets across the Southeast this past summer has found a permanent home in downtown Steinbach.

Julia MacCharles owns Milieu Market, an eco-friendly, zero-waste market and refillery on wheels.

"We practice the four R’s,” explains MacCharles. “Reduce, reuse, recycle, and refill, to help reduce plastic waste. You can bring your own bottles to fill up household cleaners, personal care products, skincare products, baby products, a whole wide range of stuff."

Milieu Market also carries other package-free products such as bar forms and creative, eco-friendly swaps like un-paper towels and silicone zip lock bags.

"Everything you would need to clean your house or use on your body, we should be able to have available or will be coming soon," says MacCharles.

She first came up with this unique business idea around December. MacCharles says she’d been considering opening a mobile eco-friendly shop since moving to Steinbach, when she found that she couldn’t buy all her favourite eco-friendly products without making a trip into Winnipeg.

"By Christmas, I was really missing it," says MacCharles. It wasn’t long after that she realized other people might feel the same way about sustainable products, and her idea for Milieu Market was born.

Prior to moving to Steinbach at the start of the pandemic, MacCharles had been living and traveling in a van that had been transformed into a tiny home, so she’s no stranger to converting small spaces on wheels.

"I thought that would be an amazing way to start," says MacCharles of her business idea. "So I started researching it and coming up with ideas and bought a trailer."

This past spring, MacCharles began selling sustainable products for home, health, and hygiene out of her renovated trailer, often parked near the northwest corner of Highway 12 and Loewen Boulevard.

"We started out with just popping up in Steinbach until the market season started," explains MacCharles. "We went to markets all over the place, from Winnipeg to Falcon to a bunch of markets in the area around here. Like Richer, Grunthal, and St. Malo. We've been all over the place this summer. We're currently at the Kleefeld market on Saturdays."

MacCharles says people have been loving buying out of her renovated trailer shop. “One thing we got asked a lot was, ‘how do we continue to shop sustainably? How do we find you?’ So we've been using Instagram and social media to post where we'll be located and doing free local deliveries to people so they can continue to fill.”

With the onset of cooler weather and as the market season comes to a close, MacCharles faced a decision. “People were asking how they could continue to shop like this. They didn’t want to buy bottles now and then not be able to continue to fill them, so that's what led us to the storefront.”

The excitement surrounding the opening of Milieu Market’s Steinbach storefront is palpable.

"We signed a lease in June for September 1st," shares MacCharles. "We’ve been working really hard. It used to be a bakery, so we've been doing a lot of renovation because we don't need the same setup. We need a big open space rather than a kitchen, so we've been doing a lot of demo and now we are building."

MacCharles says she feels extremely lucky to have her parents’ support. "My dad has been helping me build. We just finished flooring and we're putting in trim. My dad stayed home from work this week so we can start putting shelving in."

When asked what people can expect when they step into the new Main Street shop, MacCharles says it’ll be a big open space, where she can welcome and serve her clientele.

"Most of the time it’ll be me there working along with my service dog Marley -- and we will be there happy to help. There will be a huge refillery section, and we're going to have to start at least 60 products to refill."

A more permanent home for her shop will also allow MacCharles to expand Milieu Market’s offerings, as she discovers and carries more natural Canadian-made products.

"We hope to continue to grow," says MacCharles. "We're expanding to a lot more items including hopefully some more home decor and little products like that, as well that are eco-friendly and locally made."

While you can shop online anytime at https://www.milieumarket.ca/, Milieu Market will be opening its new storefront at 275 Main Street in Steinbach on Saturday, September 18th.