Ideas for Making your Packaging more Sustainable

Ideas for Making your Packaging more Sustainable

A widely shared definition of the sustainable package is that “Sustainable Packaging is the development and use of packaging which results in improved sustainability. Packaging sustainability also refers to the sourcing, development and use of packaging solutions that have minimal environmental impact and footprint. Simply put, sustainable packaging is earth-friendly and doesn’t contribute to the further depletion of natural resources.

Packaging is general in our lives. From food and toiletries to accessories and parcels, almost everything comes in some sort of protective case. The increase in consumption and the rise in products available means that packaging is being used more and more on a planet where resources are limited and ecosystems are sensitive to changes.

Here is an image of a sustainable package:

How to make your package more sustainable:

Most of the choices you make for your packaging are a tradeoff, and sustainability choices are no different. The good news is, there’s usually an easy place to start. The sustainability strategies in this post start fairly simple and get progressively more complex, with a more substantial impact. It’s all about getting started where you can and making the right choices for your company and your customers. There are many ways to make your package more sustainable like:

• Share disposal and recycling materials
• Use less virgin material
• Try alternative materials
• Avoid over-packaging throughout the supply chain
• Design for Reuse

Share disposal and recycling materials:

When sharing disposal, identifying your materials is always the top priority. It’s a more scalable option than telling customers how to recycle the materials. When they know the materials, customers can look up the best way to recycle them locally. You can indicate materials in your packaging with a recycling symbol (if the material is recyclable). Use an unnumbered symbol for paper and numbered symbols for plastic — the numbers indicate different plastic resins, and each of those has different recycling availability.

The image shows how we can recycle our disposals.

Use less virgin material:

This solution doesn’t just decrease packaging waste, but it is also economically viable by lowering the cost of materials by reducing the quantity used. Through innovative design and manufacturing techniques, packaging can be shaped to sit closely around products. Opting for a minimalist and custom-made box can be more efficient, less damaging to the environment when disposed of and make a better impression on consumers. In the Instagram era, people are increasingly expecting aesthetically pleasing and impactful packaging that can be shared on social media networks.

Try alternative materials:

A wide variety of new renewable materials such as bioplastics are becoming available and can reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. These alternative materials can have unique, exciting properties like biodegradability or compostability. Often, these materials are more expensive because they are in limited production, but the more companies start to adopt them, the more costs will go down as production scales up to meet demand.

Avoid over-packaging throughout the supply chain:

There are dozens of touchpoints in your supply chain, both for your product and your packaging. Throughout these touchpoints, products are bagged, baled, or bundled before they get to you, often using additional packaging. These layers are added to keep your product clean, safe, and organized, but often there are opportunities to get the same effect with less packaging.

Image for over packaging supply chain:

Design for Reuse:

An increasing number of brands are coming up with smart, innovative and attractive designs that prolong the lifetime of their packaging by turning it into a keepsake. Cardboard boxes are one of the easiest ways to deliver goods and are very straightforward to reuse as well. The more beautiful the design of the box, the more likely it is it will be kept for storing and even be put on display.

Here is an image of the reuse card box.

Read our blog on How you can make your packaging more environmentally friendly