Plastic free packaging: the people have spoken

After much discussion and deliberation, we have decided (with your help) to go plastic free with the packaging for our little packs of mints and gum. The feedback from over 500 Peppersmith customers showed an overwhelming majority (over 80%) were in favour of losing the plastic film around our pocket packs. (Even it meant we had to lose the extra little tab to help reseal the box). A big thank you to all of you who gave your input. We really do love each and every one of you. 

The survey also generated lots of other great questions and suggestions regarding our packaging. The main ones which kept coming up were...

Regular gum/mint vacuum paper (imagine Extra or Polos)

Sadly the paper that a lot of other gum and mint brands use is lined with wax which means they are not easily recycled. The main reason we love our little boxes is not just because they look good, they are made from FSC* approved card and are 100% recyclable pretty much anywhere.

No plastic, and a reseal tab (the dream combo)

Trust us, we tried. We even got prototypes of boxes made which had a solution with a perforated tab alongside a reseal tab. Sadly these boxes just didn’t cut the mustard. The lid would be bigger meaning it would leave us with little or no space to write our ingredients. Even more significantly the box itself would be much trickier to open – meaning you might not be able to get to your mints at all. (Sad face)

Tins tins tins

On the survey we had a lot of you mentioning that you would like to see the Peppersmith tin make a comeback. We loved the tins, but making them means making more packaging altogether. The more packaging we make, the larger our carbon footprint. At the moment, we want our footprint to be as small as possible.

We do however, think the tin should make a revival when we have bigger packs of mints so you can decant them into your tin. You’ll be glad to know that bigger packs is something we are working on too. Watch this space.

A biodegradable plastic film around the pack

This is a good idea, however using biodegradable plastic is still carbon intensive to make in our eyes, the less packaging we can produce, the better it is for the planet.

Improving the packaging for our 50g bags of gum

We’re working on it… but focussing on the 15g pack first as we produce far more of those than the bags. After we have cracked the small packs we are committed to making improvements to the pouch packs too.

So there you have it. We are ditching the plastic wrap. Again, a great big thank you to all of you who answered our survey, you’re officially part of the team now.

We will keep you updated with our progress and are also going to have a pop at making the bigger packs more sustainable. Watch this space for timings and please do continue to let us know your feedback and ideas. It really helps.

*FSC means accredited by the Forestry Stewardship Council who approve a process of using trees which are grown sustainably (new trees are planted for every one that is chopped down) and also ensure these trees can be tracked right through the process so we don’t end up with anything other than sustainably sourced card. 

More info here: https://www.fsc-uk.org/en-uk/about-fsc/what-is-fsc