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Sustainable packaging: let's do it right

Often seen as the “bad guy,” packaging can actually contribute to a company’s sustainability goals. But proper research and knowledgeable package design and sourcing are essential.

Pw 4659 Suzie Fenton

Also important is an awareness that sustainability goals include not only environmental aspects, but social and economic aspects as well.

Those in the packaging profession have recognized several areas where packaging plays a role in the “greening” of consumer goods. These include reducing packaging, using earth-friendly materials, making packaging more recycling-friendly, and helping to better preserve the products that packages contain.

Reducing the amount of packaging is a popular option as a first step to sustainability—it is relatively uncomplicated and can even be accomplished using existing designs and manufacturing equipment by lightweighting packaging. Calculating how to re-design packaging to provide better cube-space utilization means that more product can be placed on a pallet, providing more product shipment per truckload. Both of these options will most likely offer some cost savings. Shrewd sourcing can provide another reduction—packaging manufacturing locations nearer the filling location reduces shipping costs, as well as the carbon footprint of the consumer good being manufactured.

Making packaging recycling-friendly is another relatively uncomplicated path, which can be followed in conjunction with reducing and redesigning. The keys here are using commonly and readily recyclable materials, making the package of a single material or ensuring that parts are very easily disassembled, and making sure to consider the label and glue as part of the packaging components. Today’s glues are not as likely to cause problems in the recycling stream, but label substrates can still be an issue, so they are an important consideration when making a package more recyclable.

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