Our quest to improve our packaging: part I

With all of the media coverage and other information on climate change and single use plastics we thought about the amount of products we have that are all shipped in polybags.  This is quite a lot of unnecessary single use plastics that we could avoid.  

Most people who buy one of our products will open the polybag and throw it away.  If they are returning it then it is rarely returned in the original polybag so this means that people open and discard it.  We need to keep the products clean during shipping but can we do it another way?

Our existing plastic packaging

We recently wrote about our awareness that the packaging BTR use could be improved, in terms of its sustainability. We are not people to give lip service to something and not actually act on it which is why we’ve started on our quest to find better, more environmentally-friendly packaging for both BTR Sports and BTR Kids products. We thought you might find it interesting (and, as it’s turning out, in many ways surprising) the journey we take and what we (hopefully!) finally end up with. 

Watch this space to find out how we get on. Feedback and suggestions are welcome at all stages, of course!

Here’s where we’re at so far:

Step 1: first off we ask our suppliers for their suggestions.  They think we are crazy as this will cost more money, and for them it’s all about the bottom line. First scary realisation!

Step 2: we decide that the best route is to go with persuading suppliers that we are, in fact, crazy so, with that in mind, can they help?

Step 3: we’ve been sent images of possible alternatives from the suppliers. These include tiny little woven bags (synthetic materials) with ribbon draw strings in different colours and white boxes that are clearly coated with something (think disposable coffee cups) - see them below.  They really don’t seem to be getting this…



Two of the suggested alternative packaging options from our suppliers

This is turning out to be quite the mission, but we’re not ones to be put off! We’ll post again with new updates in a few days time. If you've any amazing insights into the world of packaging or suggestions of what you, as a customer, would like to see, do let us know either below or on our Facebook page.