Packaging Innovation: A Plastic Bottle that Uses Ocean Plastic Trash

Method, a company that manufacturers green cleaning products, is going to launch a new plastic bottle that actually uses plastic waste located in our oceans. They worked with Envision Plastics to figure out how to collect, reuse and manufacture a bottle using 25% of the plastic from the ocean waste. This is a great example of a company applying innovative solutions to our global problems. Learn more about their sustainable journey from the founder’s blog entry, The Next Generation.

To learn more about the garbage patch issue, visit  Greenpeace.

Discontinue Using Plastic Bags in Your Business

Plastic bags are just a mess for the environment. Worldwide there are now 500 billion plastic bags used annually. If you haven’t seen the big plastic patch in the ocean, then watch Great pacific garbage Patch. Unfortunately, these bags are petroleum based and don’t seem to break down in our landfills or water causing major toxins and pollution issues.  Be in the forefront and refrain from using plastic bags in your business.

Here are some options;

Bring Your Own: Ask your customers to bring their own bags. Better yet, create a promotional re-useable bag and sell it.

Offer Compostable Bags: Consider purchasing and using compostable bags. Roplast Industries and BioBags both make good compostable plastic-type bags.

Offer Recycling: In the interim, offer recycling containers and disposal for the plastic bags. They need to be clean and dry and usually #2 or #4 plastic which most of the regular plastic shopping bags are made from.  There is an organization called Plastic Bag Recycling that provides a system and container to help businesses recycle plastic bags.