Blister pack chewing gum

One thing that most people carry around with them is gum - a whole multitude of brands exist - Juicy Fruit, Trident, Excel, Orbit, Eclipse, Airwaves, Dentyne, DoubleMint....the list could go on forever! Whether it is for freshening your breath or whitening your teeth, most gum comes in a standard issue plastic and aluminum blister pack covered with a cardboard sleeve. However, upon further evaluation, this is an extremely difficult thing to dispose of, and aluminum is an extremely valuable commodity to be throwing away.

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: I suspect that the blister pack is to keep the gum safe, away from the elements (for example, moisture), and portion controlled. The cardboard sleeve is to convey the brand image, to give the gum an easily packed shape in trays, as well as to protect the blister pack.

Alternative considerations: When I was in Hong Kong, I noticed that they sold Wrigley's Airwaves in resealable plastic packets. No aluminum or cardboard needed. Perhaps Wrigley and other gum manufacturers may want to phase that in across their gum brands? It accommodates the protection, it conveys the brand image, it fits in a purse or pocket, and it uses less valuable materials. Similarly, gum is also great in that old school fashion of being wrapped in paper.

Make some constructive suggestions to some of the biggest gum manufacturers:

Wrigley can be contacted by email here or by snail mail here:

Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company
P.O. BOX 3900
Peoria, IL 61614
1 800 WRIGLEY (U.S. and Canada consumers only)

Cadbury Adams global can be contacted online here or via the Trident website here.

Olay Definity Products

While I was in the same moisturizer aisle, I of course also noticed Olay's new line of anti-aging products for older women, Olay Definity. Olay used to be a cream for old ladies (do you remember that "I was your teacher!" Miss Fitzhenry commercial? Loved it. And the slogan "Oil of Olay, Twice a Day"?), and in the span of a few years, it was transformed into the world's number one skincare brand. Pretty amazing stuff!

However, I was taking a look at this particular line of products. The dispensers are of course, like many others, made of mixed materials, but this wasn't the worst part. The outer container was made of a thick and heavy plastic, as well as slanted on the top so it could not even be stacked! Blasphemy from a waste and retailer standpoint! There was also a lot of empty space inside. Expensive for shipping.

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: I believe this is all for differentiation. P&G has used cardboard previously to protect its skincare products without any sort of negative repercussion. I could not find a resin identification code on the package and it looked to be made of two different kinds of plastic - very hard to recycle.

Alternative considerations: Return to cardboard usage, if an outer pack is needed. Use a cube shape to cause less headaches for retailers. Cubes can be differentiated too!

These are the Definity Products in round plastic cases:

Olay Definity Intense Hydrating Cream
Olay Definity Refining Lotion with UV Protection
Olay Definity Deep Penetrating Foaming Moisturizer
Olay Definity Night Restorative Sleep Cream
Olay Definity Reenrgizing Serum

Let Procter & Gamble know about their wasteful packaging - they are planning to get into more sustainable products and this will help them in their mission!

Procter & Gamble:
1 800 879 8433
Web: http://pg.custhelp.com

Olay:
1-800-285-5170
Web: http://olay.custhelp.com

Tassimo, Tassimo Pods

While at my cousin's house the other day, I noticed that he had purchased a Tassimo machine. Now, these fancy contraptions are for those people who are time-starved, and only want to make one perfect cup of a beverage, whether it is coffee or tea. Holy waste, batman! Making a perfect cup involves pouring in water into the machine, as well as placing a coffee/tea disc (there are options for organic and fair trade coffees and teas) into the machine and your "one perfect cup" is made. However, the coffee/tea disc is made of plastic as well as containing a layer of foil on top - and there is no possibility to recycle these discs.

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: For the pods, likely it is convenience, the nicety of having a gadget, and keeping the tea or coffee "fresh". There is a certain futuristic Jetsons feel to it also.

Alternative considerations: Whatever happened to just boiling a bit of water in a kettle and just using a conventional tea bag, or even instant coffee?

The Tassimo discs are made by Kraft, contact Tassimo here:

Email Tassimo US here.
Email Tassimo Canadahere
Call Tassimo US and Canada here, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week: 1-877-TDISCS1 (1-877-834-7271)

L'Oreal Skin Genesis products

I was walking through the moisturizer aisle at the drug store and could not help but notice how ridiculously packaged these products were. Now of course, being in the beauty aisle, it is important that products are unique and beautiful. However, this all came at the cost of the containers being made of all sorts of mixed materials - plastic, glass, metal - impossible to recycle without taking them apart.

One of these lines were the L'Oreal Skin Genesis line of products. L'Oreal has for long as I can remember, been at the forefront of innovative skincare, product design, and aesthetics, but their packaging leaves me a bit concerned. The products had a box that was too large for the product, and the actual bottle for the moisturizers were made of many types of materials.

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: For the most part, I think the gist of this package was for beauty. The box is phenomenally large compared to the bottle, which is also very wasteful - but I think it was to showcase the package.

Alternative considerations: Consider using only one material. Glass for example. Reduce the package to half the size, which a retailer can use to shelve more of your products, or other's products.

To talk to L'Oreal about this packaging:


United States:

Here

Canada:

L'Oréal Paris
1500, University Street, suite 600
Montreal, Quebec
H3A 3S7
Phone: 1-888-4-LOREAL

France:

here

World of Warcraft Pre-Paid Cards

From the world of gaming, Chris Johnson sent a Packaging Probe worthy product. He states:

Hi,

I finally got around to photographing the World of Warcraft pre-paid cards and the box they come in. Yes, *box*. The cards are creditcard-sized and the box typically contains a bit of a cardboard liner for strength and *maybe* a tiny catalogue of other Blizzard products, and the card. And air, lots of air.

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: Gift, prepaid, or credit cards typically do not have much of a presence visually and size-wise. I am assuming this is why the box was added. It appears also that the box was added to hold other information inside.

Alternative considerations: Overall, there is no need to have such a large box. A gift card typically does not break (nor will it break down for thousands of years). Activision/Blizzard could put the card in a sleeve that has the other information printed on it. They could also think about substituting the plastic card with a cardboard card.

World of Warcraft and its prepaid cards are made by the Vivendi Universal subsidiary, Activision/Blizzard. You can contact them here:

Activision/Blizzard
3100 Ocean Park Boulevard
Santa Monica
California 90405
USA
Tel. : +1 310 255 2000

hydraSense Nasal Spray

As a person with chronic sinus allergies, one of the things that has been a genuine godsend to me is this saline sea water spray called hydraSense. Essentially, how the product works is that it is filled with this imported French seawater, you spray it up your nostril, and the gunk gets out of your nose and sinuses, reducing the need for medication. While the thereapeutic benefits are great, the packaging is not so great in terms of recylability. First of all, the bottle is made with a #2 plastic, High Density Polyethylene, which is great, however, the water inside the container is contained within a PET sleeve in a rubber jacket (scroll to the bottom of this page for more info.) which makes recycling extremely difficult. The bottle is contained in a cardboard box that has an extra nozzle as well as instructions on usage. To add to that, the carbon footprint of shipping French seawater to spray up your nostril is a bit excessive.

My assumed rationale behind this amount of packaging: I believe that this has been done for sterility, safety and easy stacking at the store.

Alternative considerations: Schering-Plough could get rid of the cardboard box and instructions, and instead, print the information on the actual bottle label. Secondly, instead of having two caps - both the spray nozzle and the cap for the bottle, they could just have a larger HDPE cap to keep everything sterile. Another consumer option comes from Oprah in one of her episodes on "nose bidets". An alternative that has long been used in India has been the neti-pot, which you can make your own saline water to put in your nose using tap water. It costs as much as 1 or 1.5 hydraSense units and significantly reduces complex waste such as the kind that comes from hydraSense's packaging. I have seen them on sale here or here, however I recommend that you shop around.

To let Schering-Plough that you are not happy about their packaging, please contact them at the following place:

Schering-Plough Canada Inc.
16750, route Transcanadienne
Kirkland QC H9H 4M7

514-426-7300
1 800-361-2353