Packaging Philosophy: Karmic Containers
"Packaging is a promise," the artist Christo once said, and we agree wholeheartedly.
Just as our Green Chefs work to ensure that our products are as effective as they
are environmentally friendly (and sweet-smelling), we strive to develop the most
environmentally friendly, beautiful and functional packaging possible — to keep
our promise to the consumer. “Sustainability without compromise” is another phrase
we use a lot here at Method, and this is definitely true of our packaging.
Although many of our consumers are already familiar with our commitment to the environment,
what they often first notice about our products is the aesthetic appeal of the bottles.
Drawing inspiration from fashion and home décor, we design our packaging to sit
out on your counter (or, perhaps, a pedestal at the Museum of Modern Art), and not
under your sink. We figure, if you pay for it, you should be proud of it.
But what good is form without function? It isn’t. We’re always experimenting and
tinkering with new ideas to make cleaning better, easier and more fun (yes, fun!).
We design and test all our packages to ensure they’re the most enjoyable, functional
and easy-to-use packages possible.
From an environmental perspective, we believe that the Cradle to Cradle ethos sets
the highest bar for the environmental design of packaging, and we strive to reach
this as often as possible. Method design exploration starts with a rigorous investigation
of the materials themselves, which then informs the rest of the packaging development.
Just like we do for all the ingredients we select, we look at the environmental
characteristics of our packaging materials across a spectrum of their past, present
and future. A package with a past is one that comes from a renewable resource, is
made from recycled materials and produced in a socially and environmentally responsible
manner. The present of a package refers to its function and how efficiently it serves
its purpose— how many doses of a concentrated laundry detergent fit into each bottle,
how many bars of soap in a box, whether an additional carton can be avoided, or
if a refill makes sense for any given product. The future refers to the ability
of a package to be turned into useful materials — generally by either being recycled
or biodegrading. We strive to select materials that get top marks on all 3 points,
and research materials rigorously to find the best ones.
From the past, to the present and through the future, we will make packaging that
is beautiful, functional and responsible. We promise.
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Bamboo!
We have started using some great materials that come from bamboo, and are very happy
with their environmental traits, with how they work, and how they feel.
A little about bamboo.
Bamboo is grown primarily in eastern asia, and is one of the fastest growing vegetable
crops in the world – definitely the most quickly renewed of the sources of widely
useful fibres.
We love bamboo for a few reasons:
First, it is an environmentally responsible material. It comes from a natural source,
and as long as it comes from long-standing plantations, it will not result in the
habitat loss and inefficient land usage seen from conventional forestry. Also, it
produces 35% more oxygen than trees do!
Second, bamboo is used in some awesome materials – it has been a part of some great
product innovations. Like our new omop packages . These boxes are beautiful, and made from 50% bamboo fibre and 50% recycled
cardboard paper fibre. Even better, the boxes are both recyclable and compostable,
unless you want to keep them as souvenirs.
Our new all purpose and specialty surface wipes are also made from
bamboo fibre, which means they are free of the synthetic plastic binders in so many
conventional cleaning wipes. These wipes are also compostable, so they can be distributed
freely in the environment. They are the first cleaning wipes to be recognized by
the Design for the Environment (DfE) office of the US EPA for their superior formulation
and design.
So, why doesn’t everyone dance at the bamboo party? Well, bamboo takes some care
to be harvested and processed in a suitably green fashion. To start, the bamboo
we source is made in China, so we have to be diligent about finding ultra-efficient
ways to ship the bamboo fibre to North America to be made into the products.
Second, the bamboo must be sourced and processed in environmentally responsible
ways. We work with our suppliers to make sure that our bamboo comes from plantations
that aren’t causing the destruction of habitat, and that the conversion process
of bamboo to usable fibre to finished material doesn’t produce any environmental
problems. We are very sensitive that we not leave a burden of environmental consequences
when sourcing innovative materials from elsewhere in the world.
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Buddha Bottles: 100% recycled plastic bottles
So we mentioned that we love the Cradle to Cradle design philosophy, right? Well, while we are very happy with our progress
getting all of our formulation ingredients up to the standard, we found that getting
the packaging piece was tricky – so many moving pieces (material supplies, compatible
recycling systems, bottle quality, etc) to get in order to make a waste-free, closed
loop package design.
But after a lot of work on all these missing pieces, we have made a huge leap on
the sustainability of our package design. We are introducing bottles made completely
from recycled plastic, that are completely recyclable. And voila, the loop is closed:
a true Cradle to Cradle package.
Starting in spring 2008, the bottles on our core cleaning products are made from
100% recycled plastic, the vast majority of it coming from post-consumer recycled
plastic. Bottles made from bottles. That could be made into more bottles! We see
this as a sort of endless loop, and are very excited about it. As far as we know,
it is the first custom-designed, 100% recycled plastic bottle in the world, though
we hope it won’t be the last – the more people that start using recycled plastic,
the better.
The environmental benefits of using recycled plastic bottles versus using virgin
plastic for the same uses:
- a whole lot of non-renewable renewable (~95% savings)
- water – used in the oil refining and manufacturing process
- energy – recycled plastic saves all the energy needed to ship and convert the crude
oil into usable plastic
- landfill space – each bottle saves its own weight and more of plastic that otherwise
could have ended up in a dump.
We like these new bottles so much that we are looking at the rest of our products
to see where else we could start using 100% recycled plastic. Stay tuned!
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