The Environmental Choice That May Surprise You
The journey of growing a business is one of continual education and improvement. When bringing a product to market there are a seemingly endless series of decisions that need to be made. We at Salted Perfection are committed to using only natural ingredients in our products and being responsible stewards of the environment, so we take these decisions to heart.
When we introduced our Select Blends in 2023, we assumed that glass packaging was best for the environment as well as our products. After all, we’ve all been hearing more and more about society’s struggles with single use plastics. So, without doing too much research, the choice was made to use glass packaging for the new product line.
As the popularity of the Select Blends skyrocketed, we began to question the environmental impact of our decision. We noticed that the heavy pallets of empty jars required powered equipment to unload from delivery trucks. The boxes they arrived in contained die-cut cardboard dividers, tripling the packaging needed just to get the jars to us. And once the jars were filled, we observed that they were heavy and prone to breakage without excessive protective packaging (much of which is disposable).
We came to realize that we may have made a hasty decision out of our own lack of knowledge and we needed to do some more research. What we found shocked us. We had actually made the exact opposite choice that we should have if we cared about carbon footprint, water usage, and overall environmental impact!
We learned that switching to PET jars for our Select Blends offered several significant environmental benefits over the glass jars we were using:
- PET jars have a lower carbon footprint due to their less energy-intensive production process. Unlike glass, which requires high temperatures to melt silica, PET production consumes less energy, leading to reduced greenhouse gas emissions.
- PET jars are significantly lighter than glass jars. This reduction in weight translates to decreased fuel consumption, which further reduces the carbon footprint. More products can be transported in a single trip, enhancing the overall efficiency and sustainability of the supply chain.
- PET jars are highly recyclable. The recycling infrastructure for PET plastics is well-established, allowing these jars to be easily collected, processed, and repurposed into new products. Most exciting... cutting edge advanced recycling technology is rapidly coming online, making the dream of single-stream plastics recycling a reality.
- PET's durability and shatter-resistance reduce waste from breakage, ensuring that the Select Blends remain intact and uncontaminated, preserving product quality and extending shelf life.
- PET requires far less protective packaging than glass, further reducing the carbon footprint by eliminating roughly 60% of the cardboard needed for shipping.
- Glass production and the cardboard needed to protect it consumes vast amounts of water, yet another environmental consideration.
After becoming better informed, we decided to switch to PET jars for the Select Blends and worked with our packaging partner to source a responsibly-made PET container. The new jar is not only much better for the environment, it looks great, feels great in the hand, and maintains the integrity of our all-natural blends better due to a secure heat induction seal.
In summary, using PET jars for Salted Perfection's Select Blends is a far more environmentally friendly choice, offering benefits such as lower carbon emissions, reduced transportation impact, less water usage, greater recyclability, enhanced durability, and higher quality products for our customers.
We think you'll love the new jars as much as we do for the simple fact that they are just a joy to use. Thank you for choosing Salted Perfection and allowing us to help you Make Every Dish Memorable!
For more in-depth and unbiased information on this topic, we recommend this scientific study that was done in the UK back in 2013: CLICK HERE