Sustainability

Going Carbon Neutral is fast becoming the next big trend in retail and business at large. Sustainability has moved into the mainstream in recent years with companies and consumers becoming more aware of their consumption and the impact they have on our planet. Shoppers are favouring businesses that are reducing their use of plastics and those that are being responsible with sourcing their products. All of this is driving one of the largest and potentially longest running trends in retail: carbon neutrality.

The majority of the world's scientists agree that excess CO2 is fuelling climate change and that this needs to be dealt with immediately. Ultimately we need a balance between greenhouse gases put into the atmosphere and those taken out. Something that is often referred to as 'net zero'. In June 2019 the UK passed legislation requiring the government to reduce the UK's net emissions of greenhouse gases by 100% relative to 1990 levels by 2050. Doing so would make the UK a 'net zero' emitter.

In a similar way, Carbon Neutral and Climate Positive companies are analysing the CO2 footprints their products produce and then investing in climate protection projects to help reduce carbon emissions. This is an important global shift towards minimising climate change and its harmful effects for life on earth. Sustainable retailers who stock their products are an important part of this change.

Our new carbon neutral Bioloco Plant products are a great example of carbon neutral and climate positive products that help to reduce their impact on the planet. They have a significantly lower carbon footprint compared with traditional plastics like Polycarbonate (up to 90% less) so emissions are greatly reduced by the choice of materials. They are also made from corn sugars that can no longer be used as food and are free from genetically modified organisms, so their source is sustainable. They are melamine and BPA free as well as microwave and dishwasher safe. They are also recyclable and industrially compostable. Finally, any carbon produced in their production and distribution is offset by investment in carbon reducing projects making them Carbon Neutral (Climate Positive when they are more than offset).

These types of products are ideal for ethically minded consumers who want to do the right thing with their purchasing. Statistics show this to be a significant and fast growing percentage of shoppers in the UK. Retail experts agree, with our Bioloco Plant Kids Cup recently being judged as the Best Ethical Gift Award at Gift of the Year 2021 for its outstanding environmental credentials.

In fact, Blue Eyed Sun’s eco-friendly giftware products picked up a total of five awards at Gift of the Year Awards 2021. The new Bioloco Plant LunchPot won the Best Kitchen & Dining Award. The bespoke reusable BambooCup we created for the Queen’s shop at Balmoral won Best Own Label. The ever popular Bioloco Loop range of reusable flasks won Best Contemporary Gift and the inaugural People’s Choice Award (voted for by the public). Our new Bamboo Napkins and new Organic Cotton Tea Towels were also shortlisted for awards. 

As our new giftware ranges are now produced in a Carbon Neutral or Climate Positive way, these awards are a clear message that buyers (and consumers) want to purchase beautiful products that are doing the right thing for our planet. If you are not stocking giftware that is making a difference like this, perhaps it’s time to rethink your offering and get on trend.

To find out more about Blue Eyed Sun’s eco-friendly gifts visit www.blueeyedsun.co.uk 

If you'd like to buy one of our products please visit our consumer website at: www.greenmagpie.net

The Rise of the Ethical Consumer

How to become a Sustainable Retailer

Helping to reduce single-use plastics

How can one be a sustainable retailer? I mean, really. Retailers trade in ‘stuff’. Stuff, which takes more stuff to be manufactured (up to 70 times more, according to StoryofStuff.org). It’s also mostly stuff that’s shipped halfway round the world burning carbon producing fossil fuels that pollute our planet and produce CO2. 

Increased CO2 levels are leading to rising temperatures, melting polar ice caps and higher sea levels. Global warming could potentially cause massive population displacement as resources like drinking water dry up.

The stuff we sell also tends to be covered in plastic throughout the supply chain. Plastics take a very long time to break down and much of it ends up polluting the environment. With our increasingly polluted environment and global warming, retailers and suppliers alike are keen to manage the balance between meeting all of our desires to live more sustainably and the need to remain profitable. The question is how?

Where to Start

How can we be a more sustainable retailer? What are the actions we can all take? According to one climate change study, there are five key things we do that have the highest impact on reducing CO2 levels. Regardless of our place in the supply chain to consumers, each of these five actions could reduce at least 0.8 tonnes of CO2 from our personal output per annum:

1. Have Less Kids 

The biggest single action (by far) that the world’s population can take going forward to reduce global warming is to have less children. If you look at future emissions of descendants based on historical rates, having one fewer child saves around 60 tonnes of CO2 per annum. Each human being that is added to our planet (particularly in developed nations like the UK) has a massive impact on CO2 levels. 

2. Drive Less 

Transport is responsible for nearly 30% of the EU’s total CO2 emissions, of which 72% comes from road transportation. A lot of this is in our supply chain of lorries moving our stuff around. It’s also in the cars we drive and the public transport we use.

The ideal scenario is to ditch your car altogether and use public transport. This isn’t always practical for us though. Another alternative is to car share. Using more environmentally friendly electric vehicles will also help to slash your C02 output.

Cutting CO2 from our supply chains is trickier. Ideally orders should be consolidated to have less deliveries (and therefore less miles used). With electric trucks currently already available, we will need to encourage our carriers to start switching to these or hybrids. 

Something more consumers are now considering is whether they really need the ‘stuff’ they are buying or not. This could be the reason for the rise in food gifting and certain fashion items remaining strong for certain retailers. We all need to eat and be clothed. Make sure you have products in your offering that people can’t do without.

3. Fly Less 

A transatlantic round-trip flight can release 1.6 tonnes of CO2 per person. This is as much as the average yearly emissions for one person in India. Most of us that fly are polluting the planet for the rest of the global population. It’s estimated that more than 90% of the global population have never flown before. With global CO2 emissions growing at about 317 megatons per year, many of these people will be displaced by rising temperatures and reduced access to water and resources. 

The amount of CO2 released is up to nine times higher if you fly first class (because of the extra space in the premium section of the plane). Even local flights to and from Europe can add up to half of ton of CO2 per passenger.

Carbon off-sets should be made mandatory on all plane ticket purchases to help plant tress and support projects that reduce CO2 to offset flight pollution. Make sure your products are shipped by boat or produced locally to reduce the CO2 produced from your supply chains. Buy local seasonal fruit and veg to reduce air miles in your daily diet.

4. Buy Clean Energy

Switching to green energy supplier, Bulb, saved me three tonnes of CO2 last year and reduced my energy carbon footprint by 25%. You can save up to £247 off your bill and get up to £50 credit if you sign up using my referral link here. Bulb is the UK’s biggest green supplier, other specialists are available.  

5. Eat Less Meat

Beef production requires 20 times more land (and water) and emits 20 times more green house gas emissions per unit of edible protein than common plant-based protein sources like beans, peas and lentils. If cattle were their own nation, they would be the world’s third largest emitter of greenhouse gases, after China and the USA. The methane that cows produce is 30 times more potent than CO2 as a heat-trapping gas. 

With developing nations eating more meat, the world needs to cut back on meat consumption. It’s just not sustainable. You don’t have to become vegan or vegetarian to make a difference. You can halve your environmental impact by eating less meat and dairy. Food retailers can help by reducing the meat and dairy products they sell as well as introducing plant based alternatives. 

Data from Wynes, Seth, and Kimberly A Nicholas. 2017. “The Climate Mitigation Gap: Education and Government Recommendations Miss the Most Effective Individual Actions.” Environmental Research Letters 12(7). DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/aa7541. Image credit: Catrin Jakobsson.

What else can you do?

These five actions have the biggest impact. There are also loads of smaller changes you can make. These include recycling, washing clothes in cold water instead of hot water, hang drying clothes instead of tumble drying and upgrading your lightbulbs to energy efficient LEDs instead of tungsten bulbs. Many of these smaller changes can easily be actioned in the workplace.

What about plastics?

Over six percent of UK consumers prefer to buy from retailers that are reducing their use of single-use plastics. They also want greater transparency in how companies source their materials.

In 1950, the world’s population of 2.5 billion produced 1.5 million tons of plastic. In 2016, a global population of more than 7 billion people produced over 320 million tons of plastic. This is set to double by 2034.

In 2015 an estimated 55% of global plastic waste was discarded, 25% was incinerated and 20% was recycled. That discarded waste becomes plastic pollution that causes serious issues with our wildlife. At current rates, 99% of seabirds will carry plastic in their guts by 2050. Plastic is chocking our wildlife to death.

What can retailers do?

Be aware of the core sustainability issues and do your best to move in the right direction to create and support change. Communicate these changes to your customers and involve them in your journey.

Environmental Campaigns like Plastic Free July, Plastic Free Lent and #PlasticFreeFriday are great ways to engage your team, community, suppliers and customers. It’s tricky ditching plastic and you learn loads doing it. 

Opportunities

With more people avoiding single-use items, products that help with this are on the rise. Reusable bags, lunchboxes, water bottles and reusable cups are obvious easy wins to carry in store.

With cards, it’s important that publishers include their FSC credentials on their products. FSC means that the supply chain is monitored to ensure that the paper used on our cards comes from sustainably managed sources.

It’s also essential that publishers ditch plastic wherever possible. Almost 70% of greeting cards sold in the UK are now plastic free after changes were made by multiples. PLA compostable alternatives are a good interim measure for independents, but long term, consumers will want to see PLA reduce too.

Sustainable Focus

The key to becoming a sustainable retailer is to make your own changes personally first. Then, from there, build environmental awareness and sustainability into your business so that it’s more than just lip service. It makes it much easier to talk to others about changes that you have made yourself. It’s also more inspiring and it has a more powerful effect.

The other important thing to do is to communicate these changes to your customers and community, so they can hear and see how you are taking steps in the right direction. It’s not about being perfect. It’s about taking action and sharing it.

See the slides from my talk on How to be a Sustainable Retailer at Spring Fair at the NEC:

For over thirty years greeting card publishers have been proactive with ensuring the board they use comes from sustainable sources that are, in a sense, farmed crops of trees that are replanted in forests that are managed mindfully. FSC and PEFC accreditation both provide reassurance of this for consumers. 

With the wide spread consumer backlash against plastic, many publishers and retailers alike have been unsure how best to proceed. As with climate change, some are still in denial about whether a problem even exists or anything needs to be done at all. Plastics and micro-plastics do damage our environment, harm wildlife and pollute the food chain.

The 90% drop in single-use carrier bags clearly demonstrates that the seven major supermarkets take the majority of consumer single-use plastic and it’s here that the biggest wins can and are being made. With most of nationals going naked with their cards, cello wrapped cards will soon account for less than a third of all UK greeting card sales.

Not all retailers want unwrapped cards though, as many worry about damaged stock, which is also wasteful and environmentally unfriendly. For publishers, handling two different sets of wrapped and unwrapped cards is problematic as it essentially doubles stock holdings and ties up cash. The over riding concern, is that people give up on sending cards altogether. 

The way it was

Traditionally cards were sold unwrapped with the envelopes sitting separately behind the cards in the card pocket in store racks. You selected your card and grabbed an envelope. If the envelopes were missing, you could borrow one from a nearby pocket. Well merchandised displays meant that cards and envelopes were quickly and easily replaced. You still see this set up in stores like WH Smiths.

As more specialist cards came into the market and the diversity of retailers grew, wrapping in polypropylene grew in popularity because it’s transparent, protects cards, gives a feeling of ‘newness’ and keeps specialist envelopes with their cards.

Plastic Alternatives

Previously seen as signifier of ‘newness’, plastic is now starting to be seen as a signifier of ‘environmental damage’. Many consumers are beginning to demand change. In certain instances, where the cards are intricate and may be damaged if they are not wrapped we are seeing a distinction being made between necessary and unnecessary plastic wrapping. Some publishers have opted for ‘topless’ cello bags that don’t have the extra fold nor the plastic ‘peel and seal’ strips attached to them.

There are alternatives like oxo-degradable plastics and plant based PLA (polylactic acid). The former, which have been found to break down into environmentally damaging micro-plastics, are set to be eliminated by the end of next year. PLA is growing in popularity as it is biodegradable in the right composting conditions. 

Compostable materials have a recycling problem though. We don’t have the infrastructure in place to handle identification and separation, so both PLA and PP are being combusted or going to landfill where the conditions aren’t suitable for composting. Because of the current structure of local government responsibility for waste, long investment time frames for new systems and lack of infrastructure for dealing with either type of film, the general advice is to return to publishing cards without film packaging.

Pushing the Envelope

There’s also the issue of envelopes being separated from cards. Not a massive problem when envelopes were mostly the same sort of quality and size. Lately, some publishers have pushed the proverbial to create more special envelopes costing more to produce. It’s not hard to envisage publishers with beautiful envelopes having to merchandise more often than others because theirs get half inched by consumers wanting something nicer. 

With the need to keep envelopes together with cards and to keep displays looking more tidy, a variety of approaches have been taken so far. Museums and Galleries developed their ecoBand packaging for their BBC Earth licensed range of cards. Caroline Gardner have created an InFold, which is affixed to the envelope and card on the reverse using a plastic-free peelable label. Both companies have patents pending on their systems.

Woodmansterne have developed their own peelable label system, Smart Seal, with innovative printers, Windles, who have also launched their own commercial version called Kard Klasp. Woodmansterne, who handle greeting card brokerage for John Lewis, have led the charge on committing to the peelable label solution and have supported other publishers needing advice to make the change. Their Director of Operations, Adam Osborne, shared his learnings at our recent GCA AGM and spent a good deal of time helping me with information for this article.

Not every labelling solution appears to be working ‘snag free’ yet. If any publisher cuts corners by using a poor quality label that damages the consumer’s purchase, then it won’t be long before all labels are viewed with suspicion causing an insidious problem for all card sales over time.

Labels haven’t been problem free either. There are early reports of a few being ripped by shoppers wanting to see inside the card. Plus, they are printed on silicone coated glassine based rolls of tape that (like baking paper) you cannot recycle at home. Release paper like this can be recycled commercially. Woodmansterne have recently developed a stronger seal and are conducting trials on a new way to apply Smart Seal, allowing the card to be opened.

Labels

For those that are making the shift to label clasps, it is very important that the correct adhesive is used. It needs to hold to the board and envelope well enough so it does its job of keeping envelope and card together. It also needs to be easy for consumers to peel off and not damage the product in the process. Ultra low tack options apparently work best. Cards printed on lick coated boards with harder, less waxy inks, UV inks, along with more drying time all work well with the right labels.

Some adhesives react with the ink or varnish or sealant combination on the board. Some leave traces of adhesive on the board or pull bits of it off. If you imagine just 5 different label types, 5 boards and 5 inks, you have 125 combination variations. With so many different combinations available, the quickest and simplest solution is for publishers to use the tried and tested solutions on offer. These have been extensively tested on a variety of boards, coatings, inks, and so on. It is mind boggling the level of detail they have gone into to create these labels. Age testing, pressure tests and environmental impact are just some examples.

The aforementioned labels are long horizontal strips that wrap around the front and back of the card. Some, like Louise Tiler and James Ellis, have gone for wider labels with a greater surface area of attachment. Aside from Windles, other label suppliers worth talking to include Wrapid, Loxelys, Olympus Print Group and Label Express.

How to Apply

For those switching over to attaching labels, you can either apply them by hand or source a machine to help. Woodmansterne use a bench top ALS 4310 machine which, after being slightly modified by ALS, can label up 1,800 cards per hour. The cost of the machine is £6,000 and operator training time is negligible. It is ideal for embossed cards or those with embellishments as they don’t go through any belt feeders. You can also buy manual labelling dispensers from office Depot for as little as £30 that can label up to 300 cards per hour. Useful if you work with outworkers or don’t have access to capital to finance an ALS machine. Make sure you build a jig or template so that the label goes on straight every time.

After this publishers can also purchase a paper bander which can band 25 batches of six cards per minute meaning you can ditch your plastic outer bags that group the cards in sixes. Prices start from £3.5k from a cheap Akebono to £5k for a fast, reliable bench-top version from Jenton or ATS Tanner. Alternatively you can apply these by hand.

With Greta Thunberg and Extinction Rebellion dominating our headlines this year, it’s easy to see that the world is demanding that we take better care of issues affecting our environment. With the law soon to be introducing Extended Producer Responsibility schemes (essentially meaning the polluter pays), now is the time to act. Before it’s too late.

How we can all help fight the War on Plastic

What I learned taking part in Plastic Free July

How to Adapt to the Rise of the Ethical Consumer

Read more on Cello Bags in this 2014 blog post

As part of the #PowerOfOne campaign at Spring Fair this year I committed to taking part in Plastic Free July this year. Since I covered the spread of this grass roots movement for change in my talk on the main stage on the 'Rise of the Ethical Consumer and the Growth in the Green Economy’ and have been curious to try it. 

What a Waste

For those of you that aren’t already aware, retail manufacturing (and by implication… retail itself) is the second most polluting industry on the planet. The first being oil (the base product for plastic). The Story of Stuff website has calculated the for every rubbish bin of stuff we throw out, up to seventy equivalent sized bins of waste have been used to produce the stuff that ultimately wound up in that bin. Worse still, 99% of the total material flow feeding our consumer habits is trashed within 6 months. This aside from all of the toxic chemicals used to produce the goods and the toxins released in their destruction at end of life.

Waste is one thing, but single-use plastic waste is a particularly problematic issue as it takes so long for plastic to break down. Hundreds of years in most cases. In fact, it doesn’t really ever properly break down, it just ends up as smaller pieces of micro-plastic, which when ingested by living creatures like us or those that we eat can lead to a range of health issues which stretch from cancer to genital deformities.

The majority of us have seen the terrible images of huge amounts of plastic in the ocean. Sea creatures strangled or disabled by plastic on Blue Planet II has had a huge impact on our behaviour, with the majority of us taking action to reduce the plastic waste we put out into the world.

Change is Happening 

If you are not convinced this is happening yet, take a look at a few indicators: 

First there’s the 90% reduction in consumption of single-use plastic bags at supermarket and recent changes in government legislation on straws, cotton buds and stirrers; with more laws inevitably still to come on coffee cups and ultimately plastic bottles. Humans currently waste 100 billion single-use plastic lined coffee cups and 500 billion plastic bottles every year with over 90% not being recycled.

Secondly, there’s the steep rise in numbers taking part in Veganuary each year, when people choose to go vegan for the month of January. 40% of plastic in the oceans comes from fishing nets and lines, which as you can imagine causes all sorts of horrors for the sea-life that get tangled up in them and die. The documentary Cowspiracy calculates that for every pound of fish caught, upon to 5 pounds of unintended marine species are caught and discarded as by-kill. If you eat fish caught in the wild then you are part of this story I’m afraid. If you don’t there are a host of other health issues with farmed fish, but that’s a discussion for another time.

Another indicator for me is the growth in numbers of people taking up the Plastic Free July challenge. Now in its eighth year and boasting take up of millions of people in over 192 countries around the world.

What is Plastic Free July?

The movement started in 2011 by a small group of Australians who were horrified at the impact humans were having on the oceans surrounding them. The goal of the campaign is to cut single-use plastic waste and to encourage recycling infrastructure. People make their pledge on the website at www.plasticfreejuly.org to reduce their plastic consumption in July.

How to Join In

There are three main ways of getting involved in Plastic Free July. For the entire month you can commit to:

1. Avoid single-use plastic packaging
2. Target takeaway items (the Top 4: bags, bottles, straws and coffee cups)
3. Go completely plastic free

You are able to use reusable products made from plastic. Technically, eating out at restaurants is is not covered. 

The Challenges

For those of you who read my column, you’ll know that I do enjoy taking on new challenges, whether it’s running marathons or learning to ride a motorbike and riding across the Gobi desert. 

I have to be honest, I’m slightly concerned about this one. Using a reusable bag, bottle and coffee cup is easy and has had a big effect on the number of bags, bottles and cups I used to bin each year.

Despite already making a conscious effort to cut plastic from my life, I still buy certain items each month that are wrapped in single-use plastic. 

Food and drink is the area I am most concerned about. There is plastic in so many things, even canned drinks are often lined with plastic inside them to prevent them tasting of metal. Something I only recently discovered and never would have thought of. Most bottle tops are also lined with plastic. Tetra pack juice and milk cartons are all lined with plastic and aluminium.

I don’t tend to buy much processed food, but a lot of what I eat and drink has some single-use plastic. Rice, cucumber, porridge oats, strawberries, raspberries, salad, houmous, rice milk, sandwiches and juice cartons all come bagged in plastic. We eat every day, so tackling this area individually and together will give us our biggest wins. 

Next there’s toiletries: Shaving gel, shampoo, shower gel, toothpaste, cotton buds, toilet paper and the majority of bathroom products come in plastic. Fortunately the micro-beads that used to be in them have now been banned. There’s more in the kitchen too: Washing up liquid, washing powder, sponge, cleaning products, cling film and so on… all plastic.

New stores have been opening across the country serving the needs that arrive from ditching plastic where products are bought in bulk and consumers can bring their own cartons to stock up on rice, cereals and so on. 

More Plastic Changes

Even some of our clothes are made from plastic. Polyester and Nylon are plastics. When we wash a fleece it can shed top to 250,000 pieces of micro-plastic which goes straight down our drains and into the sea. Glitter in make-up is similarly problematic as is any other micro-plastic being washed down our drains, like parts of washing up sponges for example. Cutting back on these products will also help.

There are also infrastructural changes that need to happen in the UK with regards to recycling and collection of waste. A lot of our waste used to be shipped abroad for other countries to deal with. Recently some of them have even been sending it back to where it came from. We need efficient systems for processing and dealing with our waste. Pushing government on these issues and banning certain products is key for this.

I also run a business that has sold millions of items wrapped in single-use plastic. Perhaps you do too. Each of our businesses support the income of many people and making drastic change within it is not something we take lightly. Something must be done though. I haven’t taken the pledge on my team’s behalf, although I have decided to take action on  drastically reducing our plastic usage this year. How this will happen, I have yet to figure out, but it will.

Expectations

I plan to video my experience of taking part in #PlasticFreeJuly and share my experience on the Stories of my Instagram account @JeremyCorner. 

What about you? Would you like to change the world? If yes, then take the pledge and give it a go. I’d love to hear from anyone else that is taking part in the challenge so that we can support one another. Even if you don’t do it, I’d love for you to follow my journey so you can see what it’s like.

We only have one life, we only have one planet for ourselves and our children. Our oceans are the foundation for all life on Earth. We’re poisoning our planet with plastic, livestock farming, toxic chemicals and pollution. We must all take action. If not us, then who?

I'll be speaking on Going Plastic Free: Just how practical is that? on the Inspiring Retail Stage at 13:30 on Sunday 1st September 2019 in Hall 6 at Autumn Fair in the NEC, Birmingham - Hall 6.

The Rise of the Ethical Consumer

How companies can raise environmental awareness

The war on single-use plastic

I've been speaking more and more about environmental awareness at the major trade shows like Spring Fair and Autumn Fair at the NEC as well as in my column for Progressive Greetings Magazine and on this blog. It's a subject I'm passionate about and still getting to grips with in my daily practice.

I was recently invited back to the Sage Advice Podcast to talk about how companies and individuals can get involved and some quick wins they can get started with.

Click the play button below to listen to the short nine minute podcast:

Links to other podcasts I've done

Listen to Jeremy on the Marketing Disenchanted Podcast

Hear more about Jeremy's story on this interview with Janice B Gordon

Jeremy's previous Sage Podcast interview on How Businesses can turn to Exporting to Grow

The Rise of the Ethical Consumer is a recent trend that is having a profound and rapid effect on the current retail landscape. Over 14 million viewers were shocked to witness vast swathes of plastic waste in our oceans in  David Attenborough’s BBC documentary ‘Blue Planet II’ with the majority galvanised to take action in the war on plastic. 

Dubbed “The Blue Planet Effect,” a report by Waitrose found that almost 9 out of 10 people (88%) who saw the final episode about the effect of plastics on our oceans have changed their behaviour as a result. That’s over twelve million people! The numbers will be even greater still when you consider the widespread proliferation of the shocking footage and images continually being shared online via social media.

Being mindful of how we consume has become a priority in today’s world. Our health, the health of our loved ones and that of the planet are changing how we shop. We are becoming more conscious of what we buy, where it comes from, how it’s made, how we will use it and how we dispose of waste.

Sixty percent of us now choose a refillable water bottle and coffee cup more than we did. Sales of reusable coffee cups, water bottles, bags and the like have been booming as a result. Millennials are a key driver behind these changes. With their spending power soon to be greater than all the generations ahead of them they are not to be ignored.

They great thing about Millennials is they love to share stories around these issues. If you get it right they will lift you up. Get it wrong and you will suffer online. So, what can you do to adapt to the changes that are happening?

I firmly believe that you cannot encourage change in others without truly understanding the change yourself. Practicing what you preach helps you realise some of the challenges involved. So before we go through some simple steps, you need to commit to change yourself.

1. Refuse

Refuse unnecessary packaging in your personal life. The biggest one for most of us on a daily basis is food packaging. Our plastic food packaging uses around 800,00 tonnes of plastic per annum, less than a third of which is recycled. Choose food that isn’t wrapped in plastic and ask your supermarket to remove it. Styrofoam does not biodegrade, so refuse it whenever possible.

Ask your customers if they need a plastic bag. Retailers who use this phrase see lower consumption than those that ask their customers if they want a plastic bag. You can also help your customers by offering reusable and non-plastic alternatives.

If you can’t eliminate plastic then try to…

2. Reduce

Laminated products are not recyclable so try to cut back on them. Tetra Pak cartons that we drink our juice and milk from are the worst culprits. Switch to soda stream, filtered tap water and glass bottled milk rounds to help cut back on these.

As an example, the card industry is making huge strides to reduce the use of polypropylene bags by going ‘naked’ or switching to compostable bags. Blue Eyed Sun are trialling both options this year with rollouts planned for 2020. The major supermarkets have recently been making the switch leading to massive reductions in single-use plastic consumption.

3. Re-Use

Switch from single-use plastic-lined coffee cups and plastic water bottles to reusable alternatives. Use a lunchbox instead of buying plastic wrapped sandwiches at lunch. Carry a reusable shopping bag with you when you shop (always take them with you to the supermarket). Reuse boxes from your deliveries when you ship to customers.

4. Recycle

Recycle whenever possible. Clean your used plastic before adding it to the recycling as food contaminated plastic cannot be recycled and can even spoil other clean recycling in the bins. Donate items that are not being used to charity. 

Understanding the Ethical Consumer

If you want to understand the Ethical Consumer best you need to start living like one. Don’t try to be perfect, just take a step forward in the direction you want to go. In time you will realise what’s important to you on this new path and be closer to your customers as a result.

Business and the Environment

What Consumers Want from Retailers

The War on Single-use Plastic and how we can all Help

Dubbed “The Blue Planet Effect” shocking images of vast swathes of rubbish in our oceans in David Attenborough’s documentary aired on the BBC appear to have galvanised millions of viewers to take action in the war on single-use plastic.

The Queen has announced a ban on single use plastics on the Royal Estate, both the BBC and Sky have pledged to eliminate them by 2020 and communities up and down the UK are planning to go plastic free.

I spoke about this trend to retailers at Autumn Fair. The environment and socially conscious living are at the forefront of the minds of the biggest wave of consumers to walk the planet: Millennials. 

Millennials

With £4.4 trillion in earnings, millennials have more spending power than any previous generation. When it comes to traditional media like TV, radio or newspapers consumption is down by half, with most choosing to learn about the world via their mobile devices.

They research products carefully and spend more freely when they choose to do so. They value authenticity in brands and retailers and will shun those they find disingenuous. They are obsessed with health, wellness and travel. Most importantly they have a passion for the environment.

Part of the reason Blue Planet has resonated so deeply is how shareable clips of it have been online. Waking us all up to the effect our mindless waste is having on our world. Particularly plastic and why it is so problematic.

Plastic Population

Plastic bottles can take 450 years to break down, plastic bags are even worse. Packaging and cups made from styrofoam may be around forever (Americans currently use 25 billion of them a year). Single use coffee cups made from paper have plastic linings and 2.5 billion of them go into landfill each year in the UK (100 billion globally). There’s half a trillion single use plastic bottles produced in the world annually. We send 6 billion of them per annum to UK landfill sites.

Plastic is everywhere 72% of European tap water is contaminated by microplastics. It’s pretty much impossible not to find them in the food we prepare in our homes and in the fish and meat we buy at the supermarket. Even the clothes we wear affect our environment. A typical polyester fleece, for example, sheds 250,000 micro plastics in it’s lifetime. Much of which is washed out to sea. So much so that there is now more plastic in the ocean than fish. 

Plastic Problems

Plastic are polymers derived from hydrocarbons which are mostly derived from oil. Oil is effectively made from the hundred million year old corpses of living things that came before us. Microplastics attract organic pollutants and then contaminate our food chain causing both animals and humans a host of health problems.

BPA and Estrogenic chemicals in plastics have been linked to health issues like heart disease, hormone imbalance, increased caner risks, infertility, ADHD and even genital deformaties.

What can we do?

It’s not just Millennials that were affected by the images from Blue Planet, most of us want to do our bit too. There are four simple steps that we can all take to reduce the plastic we use in our lives.

1. Refuse

You can refuse unnecessary plastic packaging.The biggest one in our daily lives is food packaging. Plastic food packaging increased by 25% between 2004-14 using 800,000 tonnes pa only a third of which is recycled. Feedback to your supermarket that you don’t want it and choose fruit and veg that isn’t wrapped in plastic. 

Share excessive packaging photos on social media to get companies to take action and make change. If you are company that people are doing this to then engage with them and take action. Talk through what is needed and how you can change.

Some independent shops are now refusing to stock plastic bags. Even changing a single word at checkout can help customers to change. A retailer told me recently that they stopped saying “do you want a plastic bag” and asked instead “do you need a plastic bag.” The result was a huge drop off in single use plastic bags taken by customers.

If you can’t eliminate plastic in your life then the next step is to reduce it.

2. Reduce

Laminate or cello glaze is not recyclable so try to reduce your use of them. The biggest source of this in most of our lives are Tetra Pak cartons which are laminated in polyethylene and contain a layer of aluminium which makes them difficult and costly to recycle. Most councils don’t take them at the moment. You can reduce your consumption of liquids using Tetra Paks or find alternative sources. 

Glass milk bottles are on the rise again because of this trend. Similarly, SodaStream is seeing an uplift in sales as people reduce buying carbonated water in plastic bottles and make their own at home.

The card industry is making real progress on reducing plastic packaging with trials in supermarkets selling ‘naked cards.’ Asda is removing cello wrapping from the vast majority of its cards and will save over 50 million cello bags annually equivalent to 100 tonnes of plastic. Unless the card requires a bag to protect delicate handcrafted elements it makes sense to reduce the reliance on cellos or shift to greener alternatives.

3. Reuse

It helps to reuse materials repeatedly, rather than discard them after a single use like we do so often after one use. That’s why it’s nice to enjoy your birthday cards or Christmas cards up around the house and even hold on to ones that have special meaning for you. 

It’s the reusability that has a significant impact on single use items we get through everyday like plastic bottles, coffee cups and plastic shopping bags. Actively reusing reusable water bottles, reusable coffee cups and reusable shopping bags are small changes in habits that have a big effect when we all get involved and do our bit. There are fantastic commercial opportunities for retailers stocking these reusable products at the moment.

You can also get involved at work by reusing items whenever possible. For example, we reuse pallets and cardboard boxes when shipping from Blue Eyed Sun. This little shifts all help to reduce waste. Share this with your customers and shout about it on social media.

4. Recycle

When it’s not recycled the plastic we use is either going into landfill and breaking down over hundreds of years or gets into the environment and winds up in the sea. It is estimated that we are effectively dumping a lorry load of plastic into the ocean every single minute.

We need to recycle all of our plastic both at home and in the office. Councils don’t currently recycle polypropylene film so compostable bags could be a better solution, especially if we can get all councils to make industrial composting more accessible for consumers. Greeting cards themselves are an easy material to recycle as the majority are made from paper which is recyclable.

Make sure you use your recycling bins at home and at work and encourage others to do so. If you are passionate about the environment recycling is a really important way to improve things. Small changes have a huge effect over time.

What to do Next?

Build environmental awareness and sustainability into your business. Take action, join the conversation and get involved. There are beach clean ups across the country you can join. Take little steps towards improving every month.

One way to do this right now is to book your place at the GCA AGM on 17th October at Knebworth House. Sue Morrish from Glebe Cottage (aka the Eco-friendly Card Co) and Ceri Stirland from UKG will be discussing the card industry’s environmental issues and options open to publishers and retailers. You’ll have a chance to get involved and learn what’s best for your business as well as benefitting from all the other talks and seminars on the day. I look forward to seeing you there.

Global waste produced whilst you read this blog post:

3,350 plastic straws, 19 million plastic bags, 10 million plastic bottles, 41 tonnes of nappies, 10 lorry loads of plastic dumped in the sea - all of which take hundreds of years to break down.

Read more about Business and the Environment

Find out more about our Bamboo Products

How to change your habits for good

Click on the image below to see the slides from my talk at Autumn Fair:

Someone cynically once said to me that people can only be environmentally conscious when they can afford to be financially. It sounded like a reasonable argument at the time, although these days I’m less sure. That’s because there now appears to be real momentum for environmental change, despite that fact that we are not currently experiencing a boom in the economy. 

Britain recently successfully implemented the 5p plastic bag levy, which has contributed to a 90% reduction in their use. We’ve literally slashed consumption of single use plastic shopping bags by billions and there’s even talk of introducing the levy in retailers with fewer than 250 employees.

Single use plastic straws are now in the firing line with bars, restaurants and cafe’s around the world no longer offering them as standard in order to discourage unnecessary plastic waste. Single use plastic lined coffee cups may also soon be targeted with a latte levy. Waitrose are committed to removing all single use coffee cups from stores this year. Pret a Manger and Starbucks already offer discounts to customers using their own cups (more on cups later).

Changing Habits

What’s significant about these changes is that people are actively engaging with habit change. If you can carry reusable shopping bags in your car, rucksack or handbag then why not carry a spare reusable cup? Changing habits aren’t just limited to reducing plastic consumption they’re also affecting what we consume everything from goods to food to power.

This is exciting for the world as we move to embrace environmentally friendly renewable energy sources like wind and solar. There’s also been a rise in the number of vegans and vegetarians. Netflix hits like Cowspiracy and What the Health have emphasised the importance of eating less meat in order to save the planet’s resources and reduce CO2 emissions. Viral internet hits like the Story of Stuff are affecting the way consumers purchase, with a shift from goods to foods and experiences.

The most important thing to be aware of with these changes is that they are increasing as people get more comfortable with making these small adjustments in their lives.

Ideal World

I guess in an ideal world we’d completely reduce or offset our carbon footprints. Perhaps we’d stop consuming altogether and live more simple lives. We might reduce our number of fashion items like those taking part in Project 333 or we could even move into a tiny house or a van conversion to minimise our impact on the planet. We may even decide not to have kids (one fewer child per family is said to save 58 tonnes of CO2 equivalent emissions per year). 

These extreme alternatives are also growing in popularity, especially amongst millennials. It’s important that we start to become aware of these shifts so that we can accommodate them in our business models and avoid losing valuable customers.

What can we do?

As someone who loves to buy and send cards, I personally don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water. I don’t find Facebook messages and SMS’s nearly as intimate as sending a card (besides, even websites contribute to CO2 consumption). I find writing cards with my fountain pen a soulful and profound way of connecting with my fiends and loved ones. 

I’m not just saying that because I publish cards. I genuinely love them and always have done. If you watch The Greeting Card Project videos I made on YouTube last year you can see the effect sending more cards has on us. For those that love to send and receive cards they have real meaning and importance.

Having said all of that, the environment is important to us too. How can we reconcile these two seemingly polarised values? How can we reduce the impact we have on the environment and still enjoy doing something we love?

Sources

The first thing to figure out is what we are buying and where does it come from? For example, are the boards and papers ethically sourced from responsibly managed sources? At Blue Eyed Sun we have been using FSC boards since we first started although we don’t actively promote this on the backs of our cards (partly because we are design snobs and find the logo unsightly on the card backs and partly because administratively burdensome chain of custody requirements). FSC stands for the Forest Stewardship Council and is one of several organisations that promote responsible management of the world’s forests. It verifies that cetified cards are not made from rainforests.

We are currently carrying out a company wide audit of all of our material components. Once this is completed we will be able to pinpoint areas for improvement. We’ll also be in a better position to communicate the environmental provenance of our cards to our fans and advise them on how best to recycle them when ready. 

Communicating

It’s all very well doing the right thing, it’s also important to spread the word and let your customers know the facts about your products so that they can make informed decisions. This includes being transparent on your website about where your products are sourced and how best to recycle them.

Having environmental and social responsibility policies that you can share on your website helps with this sort of thing. Once we have all the facts about our sources this will be easier to communicate.

Integrity

Of course, being environmentally friendly doesn’t just stop with our products. How we run our businesses on a daily basis also affects our environmental impact on the world. Are your lightbulbs still tungsten based for example or have you switched to lower wattage alternatives? Our new production and distribution facility is fully equipped with LED lighting, which saves on electricity consumption. 

We also recycle the majority of our waste at Blue Eyed Sun, which I thought was pretty good until I met Bruce Podmore from Windles at a recent GCA National Council meeting. His factory recycles over three tonnes of nails from his pallets each year and uses the wood from them to fuel his heating (reducing their bill by a phenomenal 85%). 

Not only is Windles actively working to minimise their environmental footprint for the good of the planet, these actions are making good financial sense too. Their frequency controlled fluorescent lighting has reduced power consumption by 85% and saving money in the process. Their staff are more engaged with solutions and improvements. They’ve even won awards for their hard work in this area.

What inspired me most about Windles is how they’ve  systematically identified areas for improvement throughout their business and are continually working towards reducing their environmental impact. This is the key I think. To start taking some steps. One at a time. Lots of small ones as many big ones as you can manage.

For us, solar panels is the next big investment goal we are working towards to reduce our consumption from the grid. It’ll take time, but long term we will feel proud of making a difference using it.

Working Together

At the GCA we are working hard to try and improve communication of factual information surrounding the use of foils, glitter, recycling and so forth. There’s still so much to be understood and it’s important to share resources, learning and best practice. 

It’s tempting for any business in the industry to use such knowledge to gain competitive advantage over others. To do this is to miss the bigger picture. We all need to work and act together to show how we can minimise our environmental impact on the world. We only have one planet after all.

New Products

As we continue to work hard to improve the environmental credentials of our greeting cards and the way we work as a business at Blue Eyed Sun, I’m also very excited about a recent exclusive distribution deal we’ve signed for a range of Bamboo Products. 

BambooCup is an environmentally friendly alternative to single use plastic lined coffee cups, 2.5 billion of which go into landfill in the UK each year. Reusable cups are a booming category in retail and we are thrilled to be involved in a fast growing niche that’s making a difference to our planet.

We still love publishing cards. Now we want to offer our customers even more.

Find out more about BambooCup

CelloBags and Recycling

How to Change Your Habits for Good

Cellophane bags are commonly used on greeting cards in the UK and around the world. Whilst there was a time when lots of retailers would stock cards without wrapping, these days many are now demanding it from their suppliers. Cello bags protect greeting cards from the many fingers that touch them on a daily basis in retailers' card racks. Purchased cards are opened in good condition and consumers feel that they get value for their purchase in much the same way that many shoppers now like to have their fruit and vegetables wrapped and protected at supermarkets. Yet we all know that plastic can be damaging to the environment and takes a long time to degrade.

Recently I spoke to Richard Smith from Wrapid Manufacturing at a GCA Council Meeting to see if there is anything we can do as card publishers to reduce our impact on the environment, specifically in regard to cello bags for greeting cards. Here's what I learned:

There are currently three main options of cello bags for greeting cards:

PLA (aka Corn Starch film)

PLA (poyl-lactic acid) is a bio plastic obtained from starch or sugar taken from plants such as corn, sugar beet, sugar cane, potatoes and many others. One of the benefits of this option is that plant photosynthesis removes CO2 (carbon-dioxide) from the atmosphere to transform it into sugar or starch which is then processed (through fermantation) into PLA. This bio plastic is then turned into compostable packaging material.

PLA is 100% compostible and will fully degrade into CO2, water and biomass which can be used as fertiliser in agriculture. This works well if consumers know to dispose of these compostable cello bags with their food waste. Composting only works if the compost heap is regularly turned. If not, the bag just sits in a pile and will take much longer to degrade. In fact testing has proven that bio-plastic films do not biodegrade in landfill conditions due to low moisture content. Composting is also not easily available to everyone wanting to compost their corn starch cellophane bags. So what else can we do with them?

Poly-lactic acid film is 100% combustable and can be incenerated and transformed into clean energy. The CO2 previously absorped by the plants is released back into the atmosphere to be absorped by plants again and converted into starch and sugar once more. PLA can also be mechanically recycled after grinding, recrystallisation and re-granulation. It can also be chemically recycled back into lactic acid, purified and polymerised into high quality 1st grade PLA resin. Of course some of these processes require a lot of energy in order to recycle the material effectively. Also, because PLA requires food product to be used to make it, is it morally acceptable to be using food for packaging instead of feeding people? Will we have enough to do both?

I know of several publishers who have tried to use corn starch cello bags for their greeting cards over the last few years.  A common problem with PLA is that it can degrade too quickly when exposed to moisture. Some retailers report that the bags fall apart before the cards in them have been sold. PLA film also creases and crinkles very easily. The cello bags can look poorly made which can also have a negative effect on card sales for retailers. PLA cello bags are also more expensive than regular cello bags for cards at roughly four times the price.

Modified Polypropylene

This option takes regular polypropylene cello film and adds a proprietary formulation to special processing conditions that accelerate the degradation of the packaging when discarded. These conditions include the availability of oxygen, natural light, pressure and slightly elevated temperatures (over 30-40 degrees C, typical in landfill sites). It also degrades in the open air if the plastic is properly disgarded as litter. Under these conditions the cello bags will degrade within 8-18 months by a process of abiotic oxidation. In oxygen rich atmospheres, micro organisms attack under enzymatic action and convert the final mineralisation of the material into water, CO2, methane and biomass.

This option for greeting card cello bags is cheaper than PLA and it still biodegrades, but it isn't compostable. It's designed to suit landfill and degrades faster than conventional polypropolene cellophane. It can be mechanically and chemically reused after grinding, re-crystallisation and re-granulation. It can also be incenerated, but this sin't the most environmentally responsible method.

As you can imagine the relatvely short life span and danger of degrading on the shelves can affect the perceived value of the cards that are wrapped in modified polypropylene in the same ways the corn starch bags often do. Pricing wise this option is 50% cheaper than PLA.

Conventional Polypropylene

This is the most commonly used packaging medium for wrapping greeting cards as well as most other forms of packaging worldwide. It's also the least green option when considering biodegradation or compostability. Having said that, it is 100% recyclable through council refuse collection facilities linked to managed recycling programmes. What's important is that consumers know they can add the cellobag to their plastic recycling. If they do, then our greeting card cello-bags can be mechanically or chemically recycled into low grade plastic products like carrier bags and coloured plastic bottles. If they don't, polypropolene bags can take over 400 years to degrade in landfill. Inceneration is also not a very environmentally responsible method of disposal.

I think there are two main reasons why polyproylene is used by publishers for their cello bags: It's the cheapest option available commercially and polypropylene cello bags add to the perceived retail value of the product. Because polypropylene doesn't crinkle and crack as easily as other options do these cello bags make cards look and feel more expensive. Combine these two main factors with others like the fact that they don't fall apart on retailers' shelves and it's easy to see why everyone uses them.

New Green materials?

Research and development work is currently ongoing with the prospect of some new technology being released into the market which will be totally different to the esisting substrates. It is expected that these will be coming through for general supply in about 12 months time. This could be exciting news, but we shall have to wait and see whether these options are viable commercially and will work operationally with existing production processes.

To be green costs money

When we first met with Richard, I was hoping that using the combined power of our industry we could encourage the development of more environmentally friendly cellobags for the greeting card marketplace. The truth is that greeting cards are a tiny blip in the world of packaging. To put it in perspective, the manufacturers that supply our suppliers with the film they use to make our our greeting card cello bags supply 30 times more to other packaging markets. 

Who will pay for the premium commanded for technologically advanced films? In theory, if everyone in the supply chains contributed by paying a little more (and consumers added to this when purchasing) then we can all contribute to making a difference to the planet for future generations. The realities of making this happen are challenging. A key driver will be consumers demanding more advanced, eco friendly film for food packaging which uses the majority of polypropylene film. The supermarkets will have a big role to play in this. Already a lot of attention is focussed on reducing the use of plastic carrier bags in the UK, if we can do this with other packaging too the drive will be turned from a "should" into a "must" for everyone involved.

What can card publishers and retailers do?

Recycling virgin polypropylene (standard films) through council recycling programmes is the most responsible and affordable approach for our environment. We need to encourage our greeting card cello-bags to be recycled. Labelling and good comminication with retailers and consumers is key for this.

Another thing we can do to reduce the impact on the environment is to down guage the film thickness and limit the amount of material. Certainly we should discourage the use of greeting card cello bags that are greater than 40 microns. There really is no need to go thicker than this. If we could all shift our bags to 30 microns we would have a 25% reduction in the material used. This would be a massive improvement although it will be challenging to achieve, as many publishers use 40 micron bags because they feel nicer and more expensive than 30 micron. It could be damaging to business if your products were thought of as becoming less commercially appealing because of a change in the cello thickness.

Finally we can reduce the use of plastic in our everyday lives. The biggest way of doing this is to look at how much polypropylene is in your shopping basket at the supermarket. See if you can make alternative choices like buying fruit and veg loose instead of prepackaged for example. Let your supermarket know that this is important to you as a consumer. If the supermarkets can push the polypropylene manufacturers to come up with more enronmentally friendly solutions this will have a knock on effect for our industry too.

Read about Germany's first waste free supermarket by clicking here

Click here to read more card industry news

Find out more about the Greeting Card Association

Visit Wrapid's website for greeting card cello bags

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