Let’s pretend we’re standing in your kitchen. We’ve been talking about recycling while you fix lunch. You’ve just emptied out the cottage cheese container, and you glance at the bottom and notice the recycling symbol with the number “5”. If you live in a city where that type of plastic is recyclable, you may not know that your best hope is that container might end up as a shampoo bottle, tote, or some bubble wrap in its next life. Polypropylene, the plastic the cottage cheese container with the recycling number “5” is made with, is actually headed for what’s known as “downcycling” when it’s tossed into a recycling container. As the system works right now, it has to end up as a lower-quality material when it’s recycled, it can’t be remade into new packaging for food.
But, a new technology could change the way we think about recycling altogether. PureCycle Technologies, a company currently building a commercial recycling plant in Ohio and announcing a partnership with Nestlé, has created a new process that can now turn old polypropylene into a virgin-like material. The old way of recycling grinds up colored plastic that changes to a dull gray material that frankly doesn’t have much use in today’s market. That means even if you want to, your old toys, packaging, carpets, or other polypropylene products that could be recycled, aren’t. That’s one of the reasons why our trash system is broken. Millions of tons of plastic material are produced each year, but less than 1 percent is recycled, and the landfills just get more full every day. Or, as we have talked about in previous PromoJournals, what doesn’t find its way to landfills, ends up in the oceans.
“The core issue is the fact that you can’t make higher-value products using historical techniques for recycling,” says Mike Otworth, CEO of PureCycle Technologies. “It’s like anything else—the demand isn’t going to be very high for something if the resulting product value is very low. We’re really trying to change that paradigm in polypropylene by enabling companies to be able to now make higher-value products. Our goal from the beginning was to be able to make a product that had properties very close to virgin resin, but could be sold at price parity with virgin resin.”
Millions of homes and businesses, maybe even yours, don’t have access to recycling. Even if you do have the service, you still have to work at it. If you are not mindful of the identifying numbers and how recycling works in your area, you may unwittingly toss something into the recycling bin that your local recyclers don’t accept. Plastic bags, for example, aren’t accepted by many recyclers because the bags clog the sorting machinery. Some packaging is designed in such a way as to make it non-recyclable. Still, some of the system does work. Aluminum in beer cans are recyclable into new beer cans, and can be used over and over again. If beer is one of your favorite beverages in a can, isn’t it good to know that the container won’t be downcycled? Unfortunately, if your favorite beverage comes in a glass container, there are many communities that have decided it is not economically feasible to recycle glass at this time. Glass is easy to recycle, but expensive to transport since most glass recycling is centralized.
Don’t get discouraged when it comes to recycling, in your community and in general, just know that you need to work at it. Find out the rules in your community, and if certain things aren’t on the recycling list, get involved. Push for a better solution than filling up the landfills.
How does this relate to you and your clients? By now, I assume that you are already having conversations about sustainable sourcing and considering products that are made from recycled materials, or those recyclable at end of life. If you aren’t, perhaps it’s a conversation you should consider having sooner rather than later. It’s a pretty safe bet that your competitors are not having that discussion on a regular basis, so you can use the issue of sustainability and being good to the planet as a competitive advantage to further differentiate yourself in the market. Think of talking safety and sustainability as another tool in your sales toolbox. Does that make it easier to consider? I certainly hope so. It’s the right thing to do for your clients, yourself, the planet, and all of us.
Jeff Jacobs has been an expert in building brands and brand stewardship for 40 years, working in commercial television, Hollywood film and home video, publishing, and promotional brand merchandise. He’s a staunch advocate of consumer product safety and has a deep passion and belief regarding the issues surrounding compliance and corporate social responsibility. He retired as executive director of Quality Certification Alliance, the only non-profit dedicated to helping suppliers provide safe and compliant promotional products. Before that, he was director of brand merchandise for Michelin. You can find him volunteering as a Guardian ad Litem, traveling the world with his lovely wife, or enjoying a cigar at his favorite local cigar shop. Connect with Jeff on Twitter, LinkedIn, or Instagram, or reach out to him at jacobs.jeffreyp@gmail.com.