Organic tea producer selects cellulose-based packaging material

Lebensbaum, a company based in Germany, is a producer of organic tea, coffee, and herbs. It has built its success through pure-tasting ingredients, social responsibility, and ecological foresight. Introducing packaging materials based on renewable resources is part of the company’s sustainability strategy. One such example is the company’s recent decision to use compostable cellulose-based NatureFlex™ NVR material from Innovia Films.

Dr. Achim Mayr, managing director, explained: “NatureFlex™ combines the packaging quality and functionality we are looking for with our ambitioned environmental consciousness, which fits with our mission.”

NatureFlex™ film begins life as a natural product, wood (from managed plantations operating on good forestry principals, FSC or equivalent), and breaks down in a home compost bin (or industrial compost environment) within a matter of weeks. It also offers advantages for packing and converting such as inherent dead-fold and anti-static properties, high gloss and transparency, resistance to grease and oil, good barrier to gases, aromas, and mineral oils, and a wide heat-seal range.

Joachim Janz, Innovia’s sales account manager, says, “Our customers can pick various boxes relating to product safety and the objective to use a sustainable packaging material. NatureFlex films offer both suitable aroma barrier and a functional barrier to mineral oil migration, which is especially welcome in the tea industry, where recent German publications highlight that various tea products have weaknesses concerning mineral oil protection. The use of renewable cellulose derived from certified managed plantations, and the fact it is certified home-compostable rounds off this new packaging solution!”

NatureFlex NVR is a two-side coated, heat-sealable renewable and certified compostable film with an intermediate moisture barrier, suited to box overwrap and individual flow wrap applications.