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We’re changing the way we package our products. Having dispensed with many outer cartons, we're moving more products out of plastic into glass or aluminium. Both easily recyclable. Next month our Nutritional Supplements are available in glass jars. In September our long-awaited LifeSaver Ultra will launch in aluminium followed by Thicker Quicker Spray.
And not forgetting, that because all our products are professional quality, each bottle goes further. Our warehouse stopped using plastic tape and now uses good old fashioned brown paper rolls in the tape guns. Small changes that all add up.
But realistically, we aren’t able to move away from plastic overnight until technology develops a solution. So, focusing on reducing use for now, helps ease the problem. Here’s another way…
At school I enjoyed maths and science. I remember using Further Maths in our Engineering Drawing class to work out optimum volumes for packaged goods that used the least surface material to hold it. At the time it was less tin to hold more corned beef in a can. Now it could be less plastic to hold more volume of liquid.
I applied it to our bottles and was surprised to see as much as 65% reduction in grammes of plastic per litre of product when you order a one litre refill as opposed to four orders of 250mls. That would seem like win-win all round.
Perhaps following the success of the plastic bags initiatives, supermarkets could highlight grammes of packaging per litre or per kilo of products. Like this
There are two very promising developments going on at the moment.
1. A plastic substitute, coined vegan spider silk, is made from soy protein and degradable on a domestic compost heap.
2. A new lining material made from over 10 plant extracts which uses nature’s own waterproofing methods to create a bio-sourced compound kept in its natural form. It can line a bottle made from paper pulp to make it waterproof. Everything can then go into the paper recycling waste stream. This is what the food and cosmetics industries are waiting for.
Let’s hope they’re available soon.
Michael Van Clarke
