NEW ENVIRONMENT

MATTHEW ENIS

Last week, The New York Times reported on a new type of gallon milk jug. These ridged, rectangular-shaped jugs can be stacked on pallets and shrink-wrapped for shipment. No milk crates are needed, so no water or labor is needed for cleaning used crates, and no fuel is required to transport empty crates back to the dairy. These jugs store 4.5 gallons per cubic foot in a standard cooler, 50% more than the 3 gallons allowed by conventional jugs, making shipping and in-store refrigeration more efficient as well.

Designed by Creative Edge Design Group, Canton, Ohio, these new gallon containers have been showing up in coolers at select Sam's Club and Costco locations since last year. And, according to a Sam's Club representative cited by the Times, the efficiencies realized by the jugs allow the company to cut 10 to 20 cents per gallon off the retail price of gallon milk.

Yet many shoppers interviewed by the newspaper complained that the unfamiliar containers were difficult to pour, and that they caused spills. Sam's Club has been conducting demos to explain the environmental benefits of the new containers, and to show shoppers how to use them.

Most new packaging innovations don't require this much interpretation from shoppers, or explanation from retailers. But there could hardly be a better example of how suppliers and retailers are working overtime right now to develop new types of packaging that save fuel, save water, save money, conserve transport space — and, with all of those efficiencies, be sincerely “green” and better for the environment — while consumers remain mostly unaware of those benefits.

Of course, there's a simple reason for that.

“People are buying a product, they're not buying a package,” noted Anne Johnson, director of the Sustainable Packaging Coalition, Charlottesville, Va. “The primary function of packaging is to protect and deliver a product; we also use it to market to consumers. We don't spend any time explaining to consumers what packages are supposed to do.”

Consumers are already overwhelmed by information and marketing claims, Johnson added, and packaging manufacturers face a number of quandaries when it comes to explaining how a package is better for the environment.

Most significantly, there are a number of different approaches to sustainability being taken by packaging manufacturers right now. In recent years, several have introduced new lines of compostable and biodegradable products, such as Genpak's Harvest Collection foodservice line. Similarly, PWP's Earth's Pack line features products made from AgroResin, a 100% biodegradable material made from agricultural biomass, and other items made from recycled water bottles.

Other companies, such as Anchor Packaging, are emphasizing that their polypropylene containers are reusable and microwave-safe. Others, such as Sambrailo, are focusing on how the design of their clamshells allows distributors to pack and cool pallets more efficiently, similar to the milk jugs discussed above.

“It is very difficult to communicate something like sustainability in a single attribute,” Johnson said. “A package may allow more energy efficiencies compared with alternatives, or it may be compostable if it meets these standards. Or it might be made from post-consumer recycled content. It's a very complex equation, and these claims do not tell you a complete picture of the overall preferability of a package.”

As a result, it has been difficult to set standards or sustainability benchmarks that could be communicated in a simple, unobtrusive way to shoppers, despite growing consumer interest in environmental issues. Shoppers are still somewhat in the dark about recent packaging innovations, and in many cases they are unsure how they can best contribute to reducing waste, particularly when it comes to composting or recycling, or supporting one product vs. another based on a more efficient packaging design.

“Consumers are still confused about new terminology and what all of these new technologies mean,” noted Roman Forowycz, executive vice president of sales and marketing for Clear Lam Packaging. “We believe that it's going to require a coordinated effort between the retailer, the processor and the technology company that's going to be needed to educate the consumer.”

Clear Lam's “Earth-Clear” line divides recent sustainable packaging innovations into four categories: sustainable products made with renewable raw materials, such as plants instead of petrochemicals; fully recyclable packages made from recycled materials; biodegradable products that decompose much more rapidly than conventional packages; and “light-weighted” products that help save fuel throughout the supply chain.

Forowycz said that during the next year or two, he expects to see a flood of on-pack communication as Clear Lam and other packaging companies work to explain these concepts to shoppers, but he notes that consumers will also need other reinforcement, such as consumer ad campaigns and point-of-sale materials at retail.

“This will be an educational process that will take the next decade to implement,” he said.

Johnson agreed.

“There's a need for consumer education — can that package get back into a recycling system or be disposed of in a composting system?” she said. “Or is there some other way that the package can be beneficially used or recovered? That's a much better outcome than it going to a landfill.”

In the meantime, there are some encouraging signs on the research front, even as America continues to throw almost 30 million pounds of empty plastic containers into landfills each year. Last month, for example, Canadian high school student Daniel Burd isolated a pair of naturally occurring microorganisms that can work together to degrade standard polyethylene plastics in a few weeks, rather than the tens of thousands of years it normally takes. And Businessweek recently published a report on new types of bioplastics — plastics made from plants — that decompose quickly and completely when disposed of in yard waste or dumped in the ocean.

Regardless, suppliers, distributors and consumers are realizing that changes need to be made soon, not only for the sake of the environment, but for the sake of the bottom line as well. Petroleum prices are continuing their relentless climb, intensifying the need for packages that can be transported efficiently.

High petroleum prices also mean high petrochemical prices, making standard plastics more expensive to create, thus leveling the playing field vs. newer, more sustainable alternative materials.

It's these factors, rather than limited landfill space, that will push the U.S. toward more innovation here, said Johnson.

“There's a role for consumers, and a role for supermarkets, and a role for consumer product companies to step up and say, ‘This is important, we want to see this worked on,’” she added. “We've been lax in this country because we have such abundant resources.”