Page 13 - Georgia Forestry - Issue1 - Winter 2021

The Titan Farms peach carrier looks like a charming wood crate but is actually recyclable paperboard.
consumer perceptions, attitudes and behaviors in regard to packaging.” Among the findings:
• In September 2020, 68% of consumers linked brand trust to environmentally friendly packaging, up seven percentage points from November 2019.
• In September 2020, 68% of consumers said easily recyclable or compostable packaging impacted overall satisfaction with products, up seven percentage points from November 2019.
• And finally, in September 2020, 53% of consumers derived overall satisfaction from packaging with new or innovative features/functions,
up, you guessed it, seven percentage points from November 2019.
For many companies, that inventiveness tends to come from both customers and manufacturers.
“Clients are asking for particular solu- tions, because we’re saying, ‘Bring us your biggest challenges. We want a shot at solving them,’” Colander said. “And WestRock is also going to them, saying, ‘We think this is an area where we can
help and scale it for you.’ We have auto- mated solutions, for instance, that help you pack the right-sized box, no matter what’s in it. Particularly as more people are getting products mailed to them, we know nothing is more annoying than getting a tiny item in a big box.”
Another common denominator in consumer-driven innovation is trees. Consumers are becoming increasingly aware — as those in the forestry com- munity have long understood — that managing forests and harvesting trees is the definition of good environmental stewardship, not its antithesis. They’re learning about concepts like carbon sequestration, the circular economy and chain of custody. And they are driving the seemingly subtle (but actually far-reach- ing) changes explored in the following case studies, which illustrate how forestry companies are partnering with other industries on sustainable innovations.
Georgia-Pacific +
Closed Loop Partners
At first glance, Georgia-Pacific’s Septem- ber 2020 recycling news seemed small. Two of the Atlanta-based corporation’s mills — one in Green Bay, Wisconsin and the other in Muskogee, Oklahoma — had
begun accepting polyethylene-coated, single-use cups. The goal was to separate the PE coating from cellulose that could be repurposed, rather than dumped in a landfill.
But take a closer look at the part- nerships that spawned this recycling innovation, and you’ll realize that its potential is very, very large.
The players, in addition to Georgia- Pacific, are the Foodservice Packaging Institute and Closed Loop Partners, a New York investment firm that focuses on building the circular economy. The cup-recycling initiative — dubbed NextGen Cup — came from a Closed Loop entity called the NextGen Consortium, which was created to address single-use food packaging waste.
NextGen Consortium’s founding part- ners? Starbucks and McDonald’s.
Now we’re talking about a whole lot of cups.
“There has always been a hygiene benefit to single-use cups, but also a growing concern about their lack of recyclability. The investments we’ve made at our mills in Wisconsin and Oklahoma have opened the door to address that recyclability concern,” says Georgia-Pacific’s vice presi- dent for sustainability, John Mulcahy.
This first, technological step happening in GP’s Wisconsin and Oklahoma plants
Mixed paper at the Muskogee, Oklahoma recycling facility.
www.GeorgiaForestryMagazine.com | 11
COURTESY OF WESTROCK
SOURCE: GEORIGA-PACIFIC