Going green with packaging
For the past 2-3 months we’ve been testing out a new, environmentally sensitive coffee bag with selected customers.
Always on the lookout to reduce our environmental footprint, these bags have the potential to make a significant difference to the the landfill we currently contribute to, because they are the first coffee bag to be 100% compostable. That means that 16 weeks after they hit the landfill, they are gone. Totally. Nothing left.
That is no mean feat for a coffee bag. The ‘traditional’ foil-type bags are an environmental nightmare. The main problems being the foil and plastic layers, the one-way valve (if fitted) and the zip lock closure (if fitted), because the fact is that much of those items never breaks down, and remains a pollutant in our landfill.
Convex have developed some clever technology and design techniques to provide all the functionality of traditional bags: robustness, light proofed, heat sealable, one-way valves for degassing but in a package that is affordable and has a dramatically lower footprint. In particular, the method used to provide the degassing valve functionality without plastic components is ingenious.
More information about the features and technology is available on the Convex website and you can follow their Twitter feed and Facebook page
So the opportunity to convert to Econic bags for all of our roasted coffee is a natural one, and that will begin in January 2012.
That has a couple of implications for Ministry Grounds regulars:
- * The new bags will not have zip-lock seals. Rather, they will be heat sealed, and when opened at home will not have a built-in method of closing them again. But the solution is simple: fold the top of the open bag over on itself a few times and secure with a large paper-clip or clothes peg. Easy – and reusuable. When we do the switch, we will even provide the clothes peg for for the first few hundred customers!
- * The ability to re-use the bags as many people do with the current bags, will be limited. This is mainly a problem for home roasters. The solution will be simple: We will continue to sell the current style of bags (Kraft paper exterior, with valve and zip-lock) for people who need them. But we will not be offering them for use with our roasted coffee.
- * Initially, the new bags will be black and not the Kraft paper finish regulars are used to, but Convex are promising a Kraft look-a-like in a fee months time.
We hope Ministry Grounds regulars will embrace the new bags (figuratively speaking!) and appreciate the small but significant contribution they are making to the protection of the environment.
