body wash

When I was growing up, my family always used bars of soap in the shower. Although I was never ovely keen on the smell of Ivory, it always seemed to do a fine job at scrubbing off the various types of grime and dirt I managed to accumulate during my childhood adventures.

Then, the little bath pouff came along. During the mid-1990's I managed to accumulate a large array of them in a wide variety of colours and sizes, usually bequeathed by distant relatives as an alternative to bath salts or Russell Stover chocolates. And for reasons that I still have not quite ascertained, it seemed widely agreed upon that body wash was a necessary requisite for proper bath pouff use. Thus, it was during this time that body wash replaced bar soap as the preferred cleaning agent in my family's showers.

When I moved out on my own this spring, I continued to buy body wash - I didn't even think about it!

I awoke from my complacency on a recent trip to Essence of Life in Kensington Market. As I walked past their stand of bar soap (all natural, and sold WITHOUT packaging) the insanity of body wash dawned on me. Unlike bar soap, which can be sold with no or minimal packaging, body wash is sold in HDPE containers -a plastic that is derived from petroleum and NOT biodegradable.

What's more, bar soaps have evolved considerably from the the Ivory my parents bought in the early 1990's. For example, Lush makes a wonderful variety of interesting bar soaps. And, as the company states on their website: "We choose ethical sources for the ingredients in our cruelty-free products and use minimal or recyclable packaging." Sherlock Soaps takes it one step further; they use all natural ingredients in their soaps, and their packaging is fully biodegradable. And with varieties like ginger cedar and lavendar rosemary, it makes me wonder why I EVER thought that buying electric blue "Mountain Fresh" body wash in a HDPE container was a good idea.

Why did body wash ever take off?

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: Frankly, the whole body wash revolution is beyond my understanding. Some sort of strange bath pouff conspiracy? I can only wonder.

Alternative considerations (i.e. "what you can do"): be part of the bar soap renaissance!

Packaging on CDs (and DVDs)

I have to admit, that I am a big purchaser of CDs. I love music. Thankfully, about 60% of my purchases have shifted over to ITunes, which is a bit more friendly of an option, but really, I am a sucker for liner notes.

There are two beefs I have with CD packaging. For as long as I have been purchasing CDs in Canada and sometimes in the US, the product is wrapped in a hard to open cellophane wrapper that requires the aid of a sharp object. Then on top of that, I found out that most CD jewel cases are made of polystyrene, which is hard to recycle.

My assumed rationale behind the amount of packaging: The cellophane wrapper, I believe, is to prevent the theft of the CD inside. It is also used as a way to protect the CD case? In terms of CD jewel cases being made of polystyrene, I believe this is used because it's a rigid plastic that is relatively inexpensive.

Alternative considerations: I have noticed that in the UK, CDs in stores only have a sticker at the top and bottom of the CD case to make it difficult to access by a thief, instead of being covered by a full sheath of plastic. This significantly reduces the amount of cellophane, which is not recyclable. Security cases also seem to be a feasible option instead of using the cellophane. In terms of the material that CD jewel cases are made of, companies can look into HDPE or PET plastic. Or, musicians can look into gatefold cardboard cases, which can used recycled paper.

Contact the Canadian Recording Industry of Canada:
85 Mowat Avenue
Toronto, Ontario
M6K 3E3
Phone: (416) 967-7272
Fax: (416) 967-9415
Email at info@cria.ca

Contact the Recording Industry Association of America:
1025 F ST N.W., 10th Floor
Washington, D.C.
20004
Phone: (202) 775-0101
website: http://www.riaa.com/

Nestle Turtles 317g

During the December holiday season, it is an insane time for candy and chocolate in terms of giving, receiving, and consuming. From working with candy, December was the time, even beyond Halloween, when sales of candy and chocolate would be off the charts. It could make or break you for the year. This year, one of the items I was lucky to receive was a box of Nestle Turtles 317g. Many of you have probably had these before - they are pecan clusters covered in caramel, then covered in milk chocolate. To put it succinctly, they're yummy. I can recall that my first interactions with Turtles for about 20 years were that the box was a plain rectangular one with plastic trays of the Turtles. Often times, the pecans would taste stale. About 2 years ago, a new box came on to the market - it is detailed here. However, when I opened the box, I was dismayed to find that it was only about half full. To add insult to injury, the first packaged Turtle that I picked up was not hermetically sealed, leaving me a bit skeptical as to its safety. I also had not realized that the box expanded to be more easily accessed, as there was no indication anywhere on the box - it was not until I had researched the packaging online that I realized that it had this benefit.

My assumed rationale behind the amount of packaging: Nestle decided to individually wrap the Turtles for freshness, which up front, seems wasteful but appears to be less packaging than the previous tray format. The box is configured such that it is like a "candy dish". Its square front makes it more easily merchandised in a store and easy to ship like its predecessor tray package, and the Turtles are less likely to "fall out of place", as they were in the Turtles tray that would have been placed on its side. It is great too that they have been able to use cardboard, which disintegrates quickly.

Alternative considerations: The box is overall, well designed for its user and is far superior to its predecessor. However, Nestle could do well with making the box a bit smaller. Opening a box of chocolates to find that it is half empty is disappointing. This could also help in reducing shipping costs for Nestle as well as its retailers. There is no indication whether or not the box is made of recycled cardboard.

Contact Nestle:
UPC: 059800250467
by phone: 1-800 387 4636
online: https://www.nestle.ca/en/contactus/index

Always Dri-Liners

Alert: Do not read on if you are faint of heart in regards to "that time of the month".

That time of the month is already bad enough as is. Everything is upsetting. You feel like everyone is out to get you. Nothing is going right. You're crampy. You have weird cravings for poutine (at least I do.) I never thought about it until after I started Packaging Probe, but did you ever notice how much garbage comes from that time of the month? Tons. Apparently, 12 BILLION pads and tampons are disposed of each year. In addition to that mental image being a little gross, can you imagine the impact all the plastic has on the environment? I shudder to think. Although I have been too wimpy as of yet to make the switch over to The Keeper, it would do some good for tampon, maxi pad and pantiliner companies to reduce their packaging even slightly - it would save them money and reduce waste overall waste. See below for the Always Dri-Liner:




My assumed rationale behind the amount of packaging: It's in a little pouch so you can sneak it into your purse somewhat subtly and conveniently. The plastic is there to protect it from the other things in your purse.

Alternative considerations: The wax paper backing is completely unnecessary - its use in the current configuration is so it doesn't stick to the plastic (!) and provides instructions on how to use the pantiliner (!). Similarly, the plastic is not really necessary. Say you spilled something in your bag - since the pantiliner is not hermetically sealed it would get wet anyway. Similarly, the plastic wrapper for the case of "sanitary disposal" does not really apply since you are throwing it in the garbage anyway. As a result, I would recommend that Always could try having a wax paper wrapper with the "instructions" on them. As a side note: the perforated sides of Always maxi pads and pantiliners are so noisy when you open the package that you might as well yell in the bathroom "EVERYONE! I AM ON MY PERIOD!!!!!!" P&G needs to get on that design flaw also. And finally, the box that it comes in has a plastic window - is it really necessary for us to see what pantiliners look like? Save the plastic and stick with the recyclable and quickly biodegradable boxboard.

Always, via Procter & Gamble
1 800 879 8433
Email them and use UPC number 03700031349 6