Avoiding packaging in the supermarket: 12 tips

12 tips to avoid packaging in the supermarket

Sure: organic shops, weekly markets or unpackaged shops are the best choices for plastic-free shopping. Most of us shop in the supermarket anyway – and often come home with a mountain of packaging waste. It is not that difficult to reduce plastic and other waste there too.

Would you rather listen than read? In the Utopia podcast, Lino and Christian talk about sustainable shopping in the supermarket.

1. Save to-go products

Ready-to-go salad, fruit salad and muesli to go – we usually buy a lot of packaging waste with to-go products. The small portions are also often significantly more expensive than larger packs – good business for manufacturers, less good for us and, above all, the environment.

A whole head of lettuce or fresh fruit makes less garbage, is cheaper, and it doesn’t take you more than a few minutes to prepare

2. Avoid packaging: returnable glass instead of plastic cups

In most refrigerated counters, yoghurt is not only available in small, colourful plastic cups but also in slightly larger returnable glasses. This avoids plastic waste, and the jars can be used again and again – by the way, the screw jars are also suitable for storing preserves and leftovers at home.

There is also milk and, for some time now, nuts and tea in returnable bottles. Remember: Yogurt and milk are animal products, so you should definitely pay attention to organic quality

3. Avoid packaging waste: reusable instead of disposable

For beverages such as juices and soft drinks, there is usually the option of buying reusable bottles instead of disposable bottles or packs.

You can recognize reusable plastic bottles by their thicker, stronger plastic; You can usually get juice in returnable glass bottles.

If you want to know more, please read: disposable or reusable, glass or plastic bottles: which is more environmentally friendly?

4. No more plastic water

For all those who still carry water home in plastic bottles: No more nonsense! In almost all regions of Germany, tap water is safe to drink and often of better quality than bottled water. If you really want carbon dioxide in the water, a soda maker is very good advice.

Plastic bottles are indeed recycled, but the recycling of plastic is only possible to a limited extent, so that plastic waste is still generated. A reusable drinking bottle, on the other hand, can be filled with water anywhere, and it also looks chic.

5. Buy real bread and save on packaging.

Bread slices shrink-wrapped in plastic have little in common with real bread. As a rule, they are industrially manufactured, artificially preserved and often contain genetically modified enzymes.

Better to buy fresh bread from a real baker or at the weekly market – they put it in a paper bag or in the cloth bag you brought with you, and you don’t carry any plastic waste home. Another plus point: fresh bread from the bakery also tastes much better.

6. Avoid packaging in the supermarket: better fresh than ready.

Bag soups, microwave lasagna, frozen paella: Ready meals are usually packaged in plastic, aluminium and/or cardboard. Incidentally, food cans are also often coated with plastic on the inside.

Those who do without ready-made meals and cook them freshly save packaging waste – and also eat more healthily because ready-made meals often contain dubious additives.

The Utopia leaderboards

In the Utopia leaderboards, you will find many alternatives to conventional products. Some examples:

• BPA-free drinking bottles
• Germany-wide organic boxes
• The best organic supermarkets
• BPA-free coffee cups to go
• The best cloth diapers

7. Avoid packaging: fresh food counter instead of refrigerated shelves

In addition to the resulting plastic waste, pre-packaged cheese or sausage slices also have one disadvantage: they go bad faster. Buy your organic cheese in one piece at the fresh food counter; there, it is packed in paper or at least in less plastic.

You can also try to have it packed in your own storage jars – more and more supermarkets are now allowing this.

8. Please no squeezes & drinks for children

Fruit pulp in a squeeze bag, sugared drinks and juices in a plastic drink pack – such products are not only completely superfluous and often unhealthy, but they also leave behind an absurd amount of waste in relation to their contents.

And it’s not that difficult to puree some fresh fruit or pour juice into a drinking bottle …

9. No vegetables in plastic

It’s absurd: The only unpackaged food left in the supermarket, fruit and vegetables, should be packed in individual plastic bags.

Some of it is already packed in plastic on the shelf; sadly, this also applies to organic fruits and vegetables. In this case, weekly markets, organic supermarkets or unpackaged shops are the better alternatives.

10. Less detergent

Bathroom cleaners, glass cleaners, toilet cleaners, limescale removers, fabric softeners: the detergent shelves in supermarkets suggest that you need a separate product for each area. So a lot of more or less toxic substances quickly accumulate in many colourful plastic bottles in our household.

11. Refrain from making impulse purchases

In almost all supermarkets and discounters there are regular promotions and special offers: for example clothing, kitchen utensils or decorations that no one really needs, much of them packed in plastic and cardboard.

It is best to stay away from such offers – this saves not only packaging waste but also money and trouble because such cheap goods are usually not durable.

12. Avoid packaging: cloth bags instead of plastic bags.

It should actually be clear to everyone by now, but we’ll say it again to be on the safe side: Take cloth bags or other carrying containers with you when you go shopping, then you don’t need to buy plastic bags! Incidentally, this applies not only to shopping in the supermarket but also to other shopping tours.

Avoid multiple packaging and single servings.

In order to at least reduce plastic, avoid multiple packaging if possible. Sweets, for example, are often double and triple wrapped.

In the end, a large pack of gummy bears results in significantly less plastic waste than a bag full of individually wrapped sweets. Many mini cream cheese or corn flakes packs produce more waste than a large one. Soaps and shower gels are often available in refill packs, which produce less waste than individually purchased products.

The supermarket isn’t everything.

Shopping with reduced packaging is usually easier than in a normal supermarket in organic shops and health food stores, at the weekly market, in unpackaged shops and farm shops – there are sure to be one way or the other in your area, for example, to get fresh fruit and vegetables without plastic.

• More about zero waste
• Living plastic-free: lunch boxes made of stainless steel, glass and wood
• The best drinking bottles for on the go
• Muesli-to-go: in a reusable cup
• Packaging-free supermarket: shopping without packaging
• The 12 greatest to-go sins

Stop the throwaway craze!

Read our blog on Top 5 Companies working in Sustainable Packaging