Innovators reflect on solutions at Organic Produce Summit packaging session

Plastic is a problem.

So much so, that Bruce Taylor, vice president of organic for Earthbound Farm, a pioneer in commercial organic production, freely admitted that the number one complaint from consumers is about the company’s use of plastic packaging.

Taylor, who was a panelist at the Sustainable Packaging: Reducing Plastics in the Produce Department education session during the recently held Organic Produce Summit in Monterey, California, detailed some of the work the company is doing to reduce the use of plastic, including the introduction of a new presentation for its organic salads. 

But he also noted that the company is not willing to sacrifice quality and shelf life in search of plastic free options.

Taylor participated on the panel along with Rachel Irons of Colorado’s Nude Foods Market, a retailer that advocates the elimination of plastic packaging, and Naomi Sakoda of Driscoll’s, who gave a peek into what the firm is doing to reduce the amount of plastic in its packaging. 

The panel was moderated by Kevin Kelly, who is the CEO of Emerald Packaging, the self-described largest producer of sustainable produce packaging in the United States. Kelly noted that plastics will continue to dominate produce packaging for years to come.

The elimination game 

Irons, who is co-founder and CEO of Nude Foods Market, a two-store Colorado chain, articulated perhaps the most radical idea to reduce plastic packaging—eliminate it.  

The retailer opened its first store in Boulder, Colorado, in 2021 and expanded with an additional store in Denver earlier this year. Nude Foods Market sells the vast majority of its SKUs as bulk or in reusable containers, such as the glass jars it uses for fresh produce.

Nude Foods Market r is committed to eliminating single-use consumer containers from its stores, though Irons did admit there are some exceptions, such as strawberries in plastic clamshells. She pragmatically noted that they are retailers and their customers still want strawberries. Since there are no, or very few, strawberry growers in Colorado, Nude Foods must buy them from traditional shippers, who have been shipping in clamshells for three decades.

But strawberries aside, Nude Foods is a huge advocate of reusable containers. The company charges the customer a rental fee per container ($1.50 according to their website), and returns $1 when the container is brought back to the store where it is cleaned and sanitized for the next user.

At the wholesale level, the retailer tries to purchase everything that it sells in bulk, including most produce SKUs, as well as center-store merchandise. When necessary, the product is repackaged in a reusable container: salad greens are sold in glass jars while mushrooms are merchandised in paper bags, Irons said.

The concept worked well in Boulder, a college town. Irons indicated there was pent-up demand for the idea, with initial shoppers also being advocates of reduced packaging. With the opening of the second store and the need to attract mainstream customers, she said consumer education is a must as the store’s basic concept requires a behavioral change on behalf of its customers.

Challenges for growers

On the grower side, both Driscoll’s and Earthbound Farm develop and tout packaging with less plastic as a sustainable packaging that does not require major behavioral modifications by the consumer or in the field.

For decades, Driscoll’s has been experimenting with and pioneering berry containers that have a very similar footprint to the clamshell it developed in 1991. The company has tried cardboard boxes as well as its newest containers, which use fiber materials. 

Sakoda, who is director of product portfolio for the company, said one of the initial challenges with the newest container and its lid was that it slowed the harvest in the field, adding cost. Driscoll’s researchers went back to the drawing board and came up with a rigid lid.

During the session, Sakoda continually emphasized that the search for better packaging that eliminates or reduces plastic is an ongoing project with constant improvement and less plastic being its mission. 

Peal-and-reseal

Earthbound Farm’s latest entry into the sustainable packaging ballgame utilizes a peel-and-reseal sustainable packaging technology that has eliminated up to 35% of its plastic use. The company replaced its rigid lid packaging with the resealable film, eliminating the top and bottom label. 

Taylor, echoed the comments of the Driscoll’s representative, noting that the company is on a mission to reduce the plastic content it uses in its packaging. Earthbound Farm is owned by Taylor Farms, which is a leader in packaged salads, both conventional and organic.

The new, plastic-reduced offering does cost more. Taylor said it was introduced alongside its organic line of packaged salads with the expectation that the organic shopper would be willing to pay the upcharge. He said those shoppers will vote with their dollars, presumably paving the way for increased adoption, or sending the company down another path.

Taylor added that the introduction began with spinach salad products, as spinach is more forgiving than other lettuce components in terms of shelf life. He did note that Earthbound is looking for innovation but it will not sacrifice quality to achieve increased sustainability. 

He revealed that extensive research over several decades led to the creation of the breathable films and packaging that make it possible for value-added salads to have an astonishing 16 days of shelf life. 

Kelly began the session noting that plastic packaging is here for the long haul and he doesn’t expect to see it eliminated in his lifetime. He noted that Walmart is going to “wildly” miss its pledge to reduce plastic packaging 25% by 2025. “Now it says 25% by 2030,” he said, adding that plastics are here to stay because there is nothing to replace it that performs as well for produce.