The Full Package

What Does Sustainability Mean To You?

Written by Sherry Wickham | Jul 9, 2024 2:21:18 PM

 

You: I’d like to use sustainable packaging for my product. 

Me: What does that mean to you? 

Without a basic set of parameters around your sustainability goals, you could end up spending a lot of time, money and effort chasing materials or solutions that are the opposite of sustainable.  

Sustainability means different things to different people.  Achieving ‘sustainability’ is a never-ending journey.  Markets and technology evolve. Government incentives and requirements change.  Consumers. Investors.  Stakeholders.  None of them stand still.   

How can a business owner, a brand owner, a responsible party, be expected to know where to start stop or continue your journey? 

Before embarking on sourcing new products or redesigning packaging, take time to define your own ethos. What’s important to your industry, customer, geographic market, or company mission. How far backwards and forwards in your packages lifecycle are you going to measure? Define, with a fair degree of clarity, a sense of where you want to go. What does sustainability, a sustainable supply chain, a green package, mean to you?  Here is a list of a few common ways to evaluate and set standards for your packaging performance. Maybe you have others to add. But they can’t all be the #1 priority, so we’ll work with you to identify and evaluate the relative importance of these types of concepts to your business: 

  • Water consumption 
  • Carbon emissions 
  • Waste to landfill 
  • Raw material reduction 
  • Sustainably sourced/replenishable sources of materials 
  • Recycled content 
  • Recyclable/Compostable/Reusable 

 

The good news is that you can start from where you are.  Your team can move forward together in some surprisingly painless ways. Packumen can help you ask and answer the questions.  We start wherever you are.  We create a roadmap and we move you forward.