Inside Design: Earth-Friendly Roots
Aveda's Uruku lipstick clamshell, fashioned by UFP Technologies To celebrate Earth Day this April 22, we explore Aveda's packaging, which closes the loop in the recycling cycle.
By Marie Redding, Senior EditorThere is much to be discovered in terms of sourcing and developing recycled materials for beauty packaging. Still, Aveda, an independent division of Estée Lauder, has encouraged its suppliers to incorporate higher percentages of recycled materials in its packages.
When talking about a product's recycled content, the key buzzword is postconsumer recyclate (PCR). For example, Aveda doesn't claim industrial scrap, like the extra trim from bottles after molding, as being recycled content to make its percentages higher. Instead, the firm wants to make sure "it's all postconsumer," says John Delfausse, Aveda's vice president of packaging. "We always ask our supplier what the feedstock [source] is for our recycled materials."
Sourcing PCRs isn't easy, though. "Nothing is readily available. It's not just taking a bottle off the shelf —we are constantly asking our molders to go through new processes, and it's a challenge to find a source for the raw materials we need, with consistent quality. But we find a way. If you can find the materials, you can apply them."
Delfausse, who actively speaks to other marketing teams about how they can incorporate more recycled materials into packaging, says he advises his suppliers to invest time now in the recycling area. "It may only be me asking now for Aveda, but in a few years, if the rest of Estée Lauder comes knocking on your door, you'll be prepared."
Aveda is also making it possible for smaller, independent companies to follow the recycling route.
"When a big company like Aveda starts asking for things, it gets done," says Sue Kastensen, owner of SunDog, a small, seven-year-old cosmetic company. Kastensen says she is currently looking for a recycled-plastic lip balm tube, and none of her suppliers could find a source.
Aveda's efforts to locate PCR suppliers may help other environmentally focused firms like SunDog.
The New Tube
One supplier that happily responded to Aveda's requests is CCL Plastic Packaging (Los Angeles), a division of CCL Industries Inc. The firm has developed a process to make the first tube containing PCR. Last October, Aveda relaunched its Brilliant haircare product line in tubes from CCL that contain 35% PCR in the middle layer. CCL says it can create larger tubes with up to 50% PCR content.
"CCL is the only North American tube manufacturer that has successfully commercialized the PCR tube extrusion process," says Jeffrey Hayet, CCL's East Coast sales director. The company hopes to launch PCR closures within the next couple of months and is currently looking for a source for recycled polypropylene.
Kastensen was very excited to hear about CCL's new tube. "I heard it's tough to do a PCR tube, because when they reheat the PCR resin, it gets rigid, so it's hard to get a nice squeeze," she says. CCL seems to have overcome this obstacle, because Aveda's tube feels very soft and squeezable.
Supply & Demand
The challenge for manufacturers like CCL is to find a consistent source for recycled materials. While there is plenty of PET available from soda bottles, other types of good-quality PCRs can be harder to find and process.
Aveda's Brilliant tube, made by CCL Plastic Packaging. "PCR tubes are more costly now because of the resin availability," explains Ron Harriman, director of product development at CCL Plastic Packaging. He continues, "If at some point resin becomes more available, tube prices would come down. If the demand were there, ways to source the necessary materials would be found."
The problem is, for now, demand is not there. "Most marketers won't accept anything less than a package that looks pristine, especially in the beauty business," says Harriman.
Using recycled materials doesn't have to cost more. Aveda actually saved money when it went from 45% to 80% PCR content in its polyethylene bottles. This amounted to a savings of 150 tons of new resins the firm didn't have to use over the past year. "We save a million dollars a year in the cost of materials, because of our sourcing efforts," explains Delfausse.
Aveda president Dominique Conseil encourages his marketing and product development departments to seek out new materials and find ways to use them. He advises package designers to think about the environment first, cost second, and the look, third.
Striving for 100%
For Aveda's Uruku lipstick, featured in CPC Packaging's January/February issue, the secondary packaging is a molded fiber clamshell made of 100% recycled newsprint by the engineer packaging division of UFP Technologies. The clamshell is molded in a newspaper-and-water mixture and then dried utilizing the same technology that the egg crate industry uses. To hold the container closed, Aveda added a sleeve made from 100% PCR paperboard, printed with soy ink from Johnson Printing. "No other company comes close to making it their mission to use 100%-recycled postconsumer materials whenever possible," says Johnson Printing's president Stewart Weitzman.
"We don't use any chemicals in molding, just newspaper and water," says Steve McLaughlin, market manager at UFP Technologies. Since this material isn't normally used for primary packaging, UFP "utilized a postpressing process that ironed out the wrinkles to give it a more-finished look," McLaughlin says. UFP is now developing a compact case out of the same material.
Aveda also uses PCR in its bottles. Alcan Packaging Wheaton Plastics made the polyethylene bottles for the relaunch of Aveda's Brilliant line last October. The bottles, changed from 45% to 80% PCR material, were also made a lighter weight. The triple-layer bottles had a virgin outer layer, but after making some color corrections, Wheaton was able to add PCR material to the outer layer. Also, instead of the silk-screened, cobalt blue glass jars, which couldn't be recycled, the jars are now 100% postconsumer PET, without the metallics.
For Aveda's new Light Elements line, which hit shelves this past January, the light-blue polyethylene bottles by Wheaton Plastics contain a minimum of 80% PCR. The smaller bottle was made by Inoac Packaging with 100% PCT-PET. TricorBraun created a blue jar for the line, made from 100% high-density PCR polyethylene from recycled milk jugs. It was the first time TricorBraun made a container with 100% PCR content.
Twin City Bottle made Aveda's jar for Control Paste hair-styling cream from 50% PCR polyethylene, also typically from milk jugs.
Inoac produced PET bottles and jars in both the Light Elements and Brilliant lines, which contain 100% PCR.
Aveda continues to find Brilliant ways to design great-looking packages out of the stuff we dump on our curbs. "We would all do better if everyone followed Aveda's example," says SunDog's Kastensen.