How to be a “green” hypocrite
Mark Spaulding, Editor in Chief -- Converting Magazine, 8/1/2008 12:00:00 AM
With sustainability and environmental concern getting fully re-entrenched in the culture (since it's last heyday 15 years ago), here's a situation you're bound to encounter soon—if not already. A “green product” customer needs a package designed and converted. Keep these handy-dandy points in mind, and you too can be a “green” hypocrite.
Step 1: Design your customer's package using 100% virgin-plastic (made from imported oil) and/or 100% virgin-paper materials not sourced from FSC- or SFI-certified suppliers. While you're at it, be sure to use a thicker gauge than what's really necessary to protect the product.
Step 2: Source all the materials from China or India or some place halfway around the world because it's cheaper than getting it from down the street (or at least from the next state). Disregard the energy required to ship it from the aforementioned far-flung, foreign locations.
Step 3: Print it using solvent-based inks that will need to be infrared-dried and/or have the volatile organic compounds oxidized. Make sure the VOC system doesn't recover the heat and use it elsewhere in the plant to save energy.
Step 4: Laminate it with solvent-based adhesives (see Step 3 rationality).
Step 5: After use, demand that the packaging (due to its complex, multilayer construction) be difficult to recycle in municipal solid-waste operations. This will likely guarantee that it will end up in either a landfill or an incinerator.
I hope by now you've figured out that I'm just kidding. But a quick analysis of the average “green” product typically shows that it's still overpackaged, often in a virgin-plastic container, and perhaps hard to recycle by the consumer. Granted, not all packaging decisions get to be made by you—the converter. But the next time a “green product” customer approaches your business, stop and think through all layers of the process to avoid being party to “green hypocrisy.”
The power of the pURL: Have you gone to your personal Website yet for a preview of next month's Labelexpo Americas show? If not, go back to our cover where you'll find your pURL (personal URL address). On your site, from show organizer Tarsus Exhibitions, you'll find channels for basic attendee info, a searchable exhibitor list and floor plan, news from suppliers, an updated conference program, accommodations details and, of course, a registration form. It's the marriage of print magazines (us) and the Web—exclusively from Converting.
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Thanks for your humorous and spot-on observations!
Jeff - 2009-30-7 10:09:43 MDT -
Nice editorial! There is certainly a lot of hypocrisy attempting to disguise the naked greed of marketing and capitalism. A common example is the 'save
water, soap, towels and pandas' placards found in nearly every hotel in
the world. Yet I have never see even one recycling bin for the newspapers
that are hung on the doors or stacked in the lobby. Obviously the
concern for the hotel is the costs of laundering (panda placards) and
costs of handling a recycling bin (none to be found).
David Roisum, Ph.D. - 2008-18-8 03:29:00 MDT
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