Packaging falls into two areas for us:
We are committed to doing the best we can with the technology we have available. It's a constant work-in-progress to achieve zero-waste packaging we feel good about.
Seaweeds present some challenges as they are hygroscopic which means they constantly absorb moisture (and therefore would be more likely to harbour bacteria) from the atmosphere.
Packaging of our Products
how we wrap our seaweeds for you to keep them food safe, affordable, sustainable
'Behind the Scenes'
how our raw materials arrive and how we wrap our products when shipping them to our customers.
Packaging of our Products
Our work will never be 'done', but we are proud of where we have got to. Our product packaging is 100% reusable or recyclable.
Jars & Lids
We choose to use a PET recyclable (or reusable plastic) because the carbon footprint to ship glass is much higher than plastic. Glass also requires additional packaging to ship and creates health and safety challenges for our team and customers who handle it.
We chose simple attractive jars & aluminimum lids which are easy to reuse repeatedly, or recycle via your normal household recycling schemes.
Bags
Currently compostable packaging does not provide an adequate barrier for moisture-thirsty sea vegetables, so we use a fully recyclable plastic which can be recycled through soft plastic recycling schemes in store. See drop off locations in New Zealand here, or Australia here.
We removed 40% of the plastic weight in our previous bags when we switched suppliers. We are proudly zip free which reduced an additional 15% unnecessary plastic.
Boxes
We use boxes to provide light protection of the seaweed. This reduces waste and improves shelf life and colour vibrancy.
Place used boxes in your worm farm or household recycling.
Behind the Scenes
Progress is being made!
Shipping our orders
- We re-use the backs of our labels, and use other recycled materials to pack our online orders.
- We don't generate a paper invoice/receipt unless requested to by our customer and email it instead.
- We ship in cardboard outers.
- We reuse or return shipping pallets.
- We are phasing in paper based packing tape
We are working on
- plant based inks and water based adhesives for our labels and cardboard
- compostable pallet wrap (currently its all soft plastics recycled)
Raw materials
- We work with ethically minded suppliers who are working to reduce their impact too.
- Shipping pallets are reused or recycled and packaging materials are reused or processed through soft plastics recycling schemes
- We store our raw materials in water tight, dark reusable bins
We are working on
achieving more consistency and improving communication around our expectations with all suppliers.