At the London Marathon on 28 April 2019, runners passing mile 23 were offered something unusual instead of a plastic bottle: small, wobbly capsules of Lucozade Sport made from a seaweed-based membrane. More than 30,000 of these Ooho capsules were handed out, the largest trial of the product at the time. Runners bit into them, swallowed the drink and either ate the skin, which has little taste, or dropped it, knowing it would break down in a matter of weeks.
The capsules were made by Skipping Rocks Lab, a London start-up now called Notpla, founded by designers Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez and Pierre Paslier, who met while studying Innovation Design Engineering at Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art. The trial was one part of a wider push by the organisers to cut the plastic left on London's streets on race day. It did not replace every bottle on the course, but it showed that edible packaging could work at the scale of a major city event.
Below, the photos from the trial and the debate around it, each with a short explanation, and a look at what the idea achieved and where its limits lie.
The plastic problem the trial targeted
Big marathons get through extraordinary amounts of bottled water, because runners need to drink and cannot easily carry a bottle for long. A widely shared figure says around 920,000 bottles were used at the 2018 London race. Organisers estimated that about 760,000 ended up discarded on the streets, and they set a goal of cutting that by 215,000 in 2019.
A river of discarded water bottles along a London road after runners have passed a drinks station. Volunteers collect and recycle most of them, but the volume shows why race organisers have been looking for alternatives. Photo credited to Flickr user Paul Simpson.
Runners stream down a residential street carpeted with half-empty bottles. Bottles on the road are also a trip hazard, which gives organisers a safety reason, as well as an environmental one, to reduce them. Photo credited to Flickr user Katchooo.
How long does a plastic bottle last in the environment? Figures of 450 years or more are often quoted, but they are rough estimates rather than measurements, because the plastic breaks into smaller fragments rather than vanishing. What is clear is that a bottle dropped today will still be around, in some form, for a very long time.
What an Ooho capsule is
An Ooho is a small pocket of liquid wrapped in a thin, flexible membrane. The material, which the company calls Notpla, is derived from brown seaweed and plants. The approach is related to spherification, a technique known from molecular gastronomy, in which a seaweed extract forms a gel skin around a liquid. The result looks like a large water droplet that holds its shape until it is bitten or pierced.
The founders favour seaweed because it grows quickly in the sea and, as Garcia Gonzalez told Dezeen, “It doesn't use farmland, you don't need to water it or use fertiliser.” Seaweed farming is also being studied for possible local benefits to coastal water quality, though those effects vary and are still being researched. The company says the discarded membranes decompose in four to six weeks, about the same time as fruit peel.
A square, pillow-shaped Ooho pouch held up to show how clear the membrane is. Later versions came in different shapes so they would be easier to stack and handle.
A water-filled Ooho photographed in front of large dome-shaped greenhouses, which appear to be the biomes of the Eden Project in Cornwall. The company has demonstrated its capsules at festivals and visitor attractions as well as sports events.
The classic round Ooho, pinched between finger and thumb against a blue sky. This image became the product's signature photo and was widely used in coverage of the marathon trial.
Rows of orange-tinted capsules, filled with Lucozade Sport Orange, ready to be handed out. Each holds a few mouthfuls, which suits runners who need a quick drink rather than a full bottle.
A tiny Ooho sphere held between two fingers. Capsule sizes can be adjusted, from a single sip to a larger serving, depending on the event and the drink.
Race day in 2019
Lucozade Sport, the race's official sports drink, had first tested Ooho at the Richmond Marathon in September 2018. In London the capsules were given out at one station, 23 miles into the 26.2-mile course. The organisers made other changes at the same time: drinks stations were reduced from 26 to 19, and two stations served drinks in compostable cups instead of bottles.
A volunteer in a Lucozade shirt holds out a capsule to approaching runners. Handing a soft capsule to someone moving at race pace takes practice, and the trials helped the team work out how to do it smoothly.
Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya at the finish line on The Mall, with the clock behind him reading just over 2:02. He won the 2019 men's race in a course record of 2:02:37, a reminder that the trial took place at one of the fastest marathons in the world.
The video shows volunteers distributing the capsules at the race and runners trying them for the first time.
Beyond the marathon: sauces, takeaway boxes and a prize
The same material can wrap more than sports drinks. The company has made capsules for cocktails and spirits at festivals, sachets for sauces and dressings, and water-resistant coatings for cardboard food boxes. It has also talked about films and nets for fresh produce and packaging for non-food items.
A seaweed sachet of ketchup squeezed over chicken nuggets at a Just Eat event. The delivery platform tested Notpla sauce sachets, and in 2022 the company produced more than a million coated takeaway boxes for Just Eat, according to the BBC.
In December 2022 Notpla won a £1 million Earthshot Prize, the environmental award founded by Prince William, in the "building a waste-free world" category. For a company that began with a wobbly blob of water, it was a big step towards the mainstream.
How readers responded
When the marathon trial was shared online, the response was overwhelmingly positive. A selection of the comments:
A short note of praise with heart emojis. Many comments were simple expressions of support like this one.
One commenter picked up the organisers' goal of using some 200,000 fewer bottles, a figure close to the official target of 215,000.
A reader called the trial a great beginning and asked whether the idea could be taken to countries such as Cambodia, where plastic waste is a pressing problem.
"Fantastic achievement" from a top contributor on the page.
A playful comparison with bubble wrap: popping a sheet of Oohos, this reader joked, would be more entertaining and far less polluting.
A commenter thanked the inventors, saying the planet is the only one we have.
One reader called it the future of the water bottle, a hope shared by many, though the reality is more complicated, as the next section explains.
A final comment with a seaside pun about a wave of change, a fitting image for a product made from seaweed.
What the trial showed, and its limits
The 2019 trial proved that edible capsules can be made, filled and handed out in large numbers at a live event, and that runners will use them. It did not show that seaweed membranes can replace bottles in shops. Capsules are best for small portions drunk immediately; they have a shorter shelf life than a sealed bottle, and the membrane needs clean handling, which is easier at a staffed drinks station than on a supermarket shelf.
It is also worth remembering that "biodegradable" does not mean "litter-free". Capsule skins still need to be collected at events, and in the wild they break down far more slowly in cold or dry conditions than in a compost heap. The most effective measures remain the simple ones the organisers combined with the trial: fewer drinks stations, refillable or compostable cups, and good collection and recycling.
For anyone organising a local race, festival or school event, the lessons carry over: measure how much single-use packaging you currently use, set a specific reduction target, test alternatives at one station first, and plan the collection as carefully as the distribution.
Sources: Dezeen, 29 April 2019: London Marathon offers edible seaweed drinks capsules as alternative to plastic bottles; The Fish Site, December 2022: Notpla wins Earthshot Prize; Design Museum: Lucozade Sport Ooho Capsules; Notpla. Photos: Paul Simpson, Katchooo (Flickr), Notpla/Skipping Rocks Lab; video and comments via Facebook.
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