Why standardized packaging is key to reducing plastic waste

Could the solution to plastic waste be as straightforward as standardization?

A new report by waste management company Biffa explores how the United Kingdom can significantly reduce its plastic packaging waste. Across a range of solutions, standardized packaging materials emerged as the greatest potential solution. 

Biffa estimated that standardization could help to divert up to 0.8 million metric tons of plastic waste from landfills by 2029. That’s about 337 Olympic swimming pools’ worth of plastic waste. 

In his recent book “Wasteland,” waste journalist Oliver Franklin-Wallis quotes Biffa Polymers’ Commercial Director Chris Hanlon:

“If we really want to fix plastics recycling, we should scrap the labels and the International Resin Code. There should probably be three or four categories — so get rid of everything else. Get rid of multilayered films, multi-material packaging. Why are we still selling sandwiches in cardboard and plastic? Do it in cardboard or do it in plastic. The trick would be to make packaging standardized, like milk bottles.”

This speaks to a fundamental problem with today’s packaging: It’s become far too complicated for most consumers to follow along. The average consumer might understand the basics of recycling cans and bottles, but multilayered films and multimaterial components are still time-consuming and complex to sort and separate. 

Familiar products with standardized packaging formats 

So what would it look like to streamline packaging? As Hanlon points out, we already have a number of product categories where one material or format is king:

• Milk: Despite the explosion of milk options, all milk is packaged in essentially just three formats: coated cartons; plastic jugs; or glass bottles. 
• Cereal: While some brands have experimented with bagged cereal, nearly all are still using the same bag-in-a-box model consumers have seen since the 1950s. 
• Toothpaste: Tubes are inching toward recyclability through design improvements, but for now, consumers have few alternative formats for toothpaste packaging. 
• Protein and snack bars: Although they’re recyclable only through special drop-off collection programs in the U.S., snack bars are an example of a category locked almost exclusively into a challenging multilayer plastic format. 

When it comes to standardization, I think of the saying: A rising tide lifts all boats. Even with formats such as toothpaste tubes and snack bars, standardized packaging ensures that when progress is made to improve a format’s recyclability, the whole category advances. 

Companies are often intimidated by standardization. Anything that gets in the way of differentiating your brand from your competitors is a tough sell to a room full of marketers. Yet somehow, despite the same boxes and tubes, we all have a favorite cereal and toothpaste brand. 

Standardization could be a central tenet of the circular economy 

Will the benefits of standardization persuade engineers and marketers? If companies are already using the same formats as their peers for both readily recyclable and recyclability-challenged products, why not work together to move into — or back into — simpler packages such as boxes, jars and cartons?

Here are five more examples of sharing and standardization in the context of reuse, an area where standardization is key to creating cost-effective, scalable and environmentally preferable programs: 

• Genossenschaft Deutscher Brunnen (GDB), a German sales and purchasing cooperative in the mineral water industry, offers refillable beverage bottles for carbonated beverages and mineral water products as part of a managed pool system. Their iconic “pearl bottle” design is available in 12 formats, including different sizes and colors. 

• Also in Germany, the Mach-Mehrweg-Pool (MMP) is a reusable glass container pool composed of 21 member companies that share milk and cream bottles, yogurt and cream jars, and transport crates. 

• The Los Angeles-based company Replenish offers reusable spray bottles that attach to pods with liquid concentrates ranging from cleaning to personal care, meaning consumers can use one bottle for a variety of purposes. The Replenish bottling platform can be adapted to all product offerings, allowing companies to white label under their own brand. 

• The Swedish Return System is a shared system of reusable crates and pallets used by the country’s food and drinks industry. The system has over 1,500 participating businesses. The result? Over 50 percent of all fresh produce in Sweden is delivered in reusable packaging. 

• In Frankfurt, Germany, Circolution is a smart reusable packaging provider that rents out reusable containers for packaged foods, takes care of reverse logistics and tracks containers throughout the journey.

If companies converged on just a handful of packaging formats — say, jars and bottles, cartons and boxes, tubes and tubs — it would be easier to test for and communicate how recyclable these packages are, and to redesign them with reusability in mind. And if they do, maybe we’ll find that the key to circularity lies in simpler, standardized design.

P.S. For French readers or those with patience for auto-translation errors, the French producer responsibility organization Citeo has written a very thorough guide to standardizing reusable packaging for fresh packaged food, food service, and beverage.