It’s been nine months since the startup Loop, brainchild of TerraCycle founder and CEO Tom Szaky, took the world by storm with its zero-waste circular delivery service. If you’re like us at TriplePundit, you’re probably wondering how it is doing as it nears the one-year mark. While the company does not disclose its total number of subscribers, Szaky gave a candid update at last week’s Bloomberg Sustainable Business Summit in New York.

Adding one brand per day

First announced at the World Economic Forum in January, Loop made its initial start with pilots in metro New York and Paris. Ever since, Szaky says, business has been quickly growing. Today, Loop is available in select areas in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maryland and Washington, D.C. It is in the process of expanding throughout the United States, as well as the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany and Japan, Szaky said. And with comments such as “When is Loop coming to Illinois….I can’t wait!” sprinkled across Loop’s Instagram account, it seems expansion can’t come soon enough for many. Loop’s value proposition is enabling the consumer “to responsibly consume a variety of commonly used products from leading consumer brands in customized, brand-specific durable packaging delivered in a specially designed reusable shipping tote.” When finished with the product, the packaging is collected, cleaned, refilled and reused. There are no monthly membership fees or subscriptions, although customers do pay a refundable one-time deposit to borrow the reusable container. “Loop will not just eliminate the idea of packaging waste, but greatly improve the product experience and shopping convenience,” Szaky said at the launch. The initial coalition included 28 partners such as Procter & Gamble, Unilever, PepsiCo, Mondelez International, Nestlé, Danone and UPS.  Today, the list has grown to 42 partners selling brands such as Häagen-Dazs, Tide, Tropicana and Colgate. Essential to Loop’s success is its ability to offer consumers the same choice they would find in brick-and-mortar retail stores, and the Loop management team knew that quickly scaling up offerings was key. According to Szaky, Loop is now adding approximately one new brand per day. The brands themselves seem to be having fun with new packaging design, such as Procter & Gamble, whose ProPantene shampoo and conditioner containers are emblazoned with “I Reuse….I Love the Oceans.”

Shoppers love ice cream from Loop, but not for the reason expected

While the products do come shipped in reusable Loop containers, critics on social media have pointed out that some of the products that Loop sells—including detergent pods and wipes—contain plastic that is not recyclable. But it turns out that this may not be relevant to the majority of Loop consumers: Only a third of Loop subscribers joined the service based on sustainability concerns, Szaky said; the majority claim to have joined because of the model itself, including its convenience, something that even Szaky found surprising—and, it seems, a little frustrating given his zero-waste zeal. To date, the company says beverages in glass bottles such as Evian and Tropicana have been among the top-selling products among Loop subscribers in France. In the United States, top sellers include Clorox wipes, Cascade dishwasher detergent tabs, Pantene shampoo and Häagen-Dazs ice cream.

A few habits that throw this circular economy model for a loop

Another interesting learning that Szaky shared was that while Loop customers want similar prices for products they would buy in traditional stores, they have not been price sensitive to the deposit fees. “It’s exciting that consumers are willing to temporarily invest in the reusable containers,” he remarked. While temporary, the cost of the containers, in some cases, are not inexpensive. Take two of the top-selling products: The container for Clorox Wipes requires a $10 deposit, while the deposit for the Häagen-Dazs ice cream container is $5. Only time will tell if the model will continue to be successful, especially as more and more companies, from Unilever to Nestlé, pledge to reduce their use of plastic packaging in the next 10 to 20 years. For now, however, this service seems to be a model in high demand.

Tweed and TerraCycle launched a cannabis packaging recycling program in October 2018 and recently celebrated a significant milestone with the collection of more than 1 million pieces of used cannabis packaging from across Canada⁠—recycling more than 22,000 pounds of plastic containers, tubes and bottles.   "When Tweed launched the partnership with TerraCycle, it was the first recycling program of its kind for cannabis packaging. Reaching this incredible milestone of over 1 million pieces collected in less than one year demonstrates the value of the program," said Mark Zekulin, CEO of Canopy Growth Corporation, Tweed's parent company, in a statement. "We're committed to doubling down on our efforts to expand the program over the next year and bringing in new participants from all across Canada."   Tweed and TerraCycle launched a cannabis packaging recycling program in October 2018 and recently celebrated a significant milestone with the collection of more than 1 million pieces of used cannabis packaging from across Canada⁠—recycling more than 22,000 pounds of plastic containers, tubes and bottles.   "When Tweed launched the partnership with TerraCycle, it was the first recycling program of its kind for cannabis packaging. Reaching this incredible milestone of over 1 million pieces collected in less than one year demonstrates the value of the program," said Mark Zekulin, CEO of Canopy Growth Corporation, Tweed's parent company, in a statement. "We're committed to doubling down on our efforts to expand the program over the next year and bringing in new participants from all across Canada."   "Park benches, picnic tables, playgrounds—these are just a few examples of products that can be created from the recycled cannabis packaging collected through the Tweed | TerraCycle program," said Tom Szaky, CEO and founder of TerraCycle, in a statement. "Through our mission to 'Eliminate the Idea of Waste,' we've proven that solutions do exist for items that may seem difficult to recycle. Together, we can reduce the environmental impact of the cannabis industry and pave the way for a greener future."   Originally launched in select Tweed, Tokyo Smoke and third-party retail stores, the Tweed | TerraCycle program has expanded across the country to now include 280 retail participants.   Below is a tally of the number of pieces collected as of August 31, 2019, broken out by province:  

• Alberta - 407,695
• New Brunswick - 168,550
• Ontario - 168,545
• Newfoundland and Labrador - 163,200
• Manitoba - 124,850
• Saskatchewan - 51,900
• Prince Edward Island - 38,299
• British Columbia - 23,400

  The program not only provides recycling solutions for Tweed-branded cannabis packaging, it also encourages consumers to recycle their empty cannabis packaging from any Canadian licensed producer. The program accepts any and all cannabis packaging, including outer plastic packaging, inner plastic packaging, tins, tubes, plastic bottles, plastic caps and flexible plastic bags.   Consumers are invited to drop off their used cannabis packaging at participating Tweed | TerraCycle retail locations. They may also register online for free pre-paid shipping labels to mail in their empty containers for recycling.

31 Oct 2019 --- Early childhood nutrition Nestlé-subsidiary Gerber is partnering with recycling specialist TerraCycle to involve consumers in a free recycling program. Caregivers will now be able to mail in packaging that is not municipally recyclable using a prepaid shipping label. Once collected, the packaging is cleaned and melted into hard plastic that can be remolded to make new recycled products. Additionally, for every pound of packaging waste sent to TerraCycle through the Gerber Recycling Program, collectors can earn US$1 to donate to a non-profit, school or charitable organization of their choice. This move comes as companies are under increasing pressure – both from consumers and at a policy level – to reduce their impact on the environment.   “It would be more effective to design all packaging to be recycled by existing waste streams and there is currently a number of baby food product packaging that can be accepted curbside. Unfortunately, given the limitations on what is accepted at municipal facilities and the trend to develop packaging that is disposable and lightweight, that is not the case for every product,” Sue Kauffman, North American Public Relations Manager at TerraCycle, tells PackagingInsights.   In an effort to combat this issue, Gerber and TerraCycle partnered to create the Gerber Recycling program to divert all baby food packaging, outside of what is accepted curbside, from the landfill, Kauffman adds. The shipments will be coordinated through UPS, which Kauffman describes as being one of the most sustainable shipping companies in the world. When the baby food packaging waste is returned to TerraCycle the shipments are bundled into existing routes that UPS is already driving, so no new routes are created to fulfill this recycling program, she explains.   “Through this program, Gerber is offering parents an easy way to divert waste from landfills by providing a responsible way to dispose of certain hard-to-recycle baby food packaging,” adds TerraCycle CEO and Founder, Tom Szaky. “By collecting and recycling these items, families can demonstrate their respect for the environment not only through the products that they choose for their children but also with how they dispose of the packaging.”   Recycling is in part about economics – the value of the raw materials collected in the municipal programs needs to exceed the cost of collecting them. In the case of hard-to-recycle items, the cost associated in processing complex packaging exceeds its value. Kauffman explains that it is the trend of sending baby food packaging that does not fall into the accepted waste parameters at a municipal facility to a landfill that the partnership aims to counter.   Gerber highlights that this partnership is one of many steps toward its goal to achieve 100 percent recyclable or reusable packaging by 2025. The Gerber Recycling Program is open to any interested individual, school, office, or community organization.   Customers can sign up to participate through the Gerber Recycling Program webpage. The companies expect that the program will be successful in terms of uptake level. Since its founding over 15 years ago, Terracycle has recycled more than seven billion pieces of waste that consumers have voluntarily sent.   By Katherine Durrell

Art All Day returns on Saturday, Nov. 2, with its annual afternoon of open artist studios, gallery exhibitions, live art making, mural installations, and walking, biking, and trolley tours.   The citywide celebration that attracts thousands of visitors, hundreds of artists, and scores of venues runs from noon to 6 p.m.   The event launched in 2012 is produced and coordinated by Artworks Trenton, the nonprofit arts center that houses galleries and studios and coordinates the noted Art All Night event in the spring.   Art All Day visitors simply go to Artworks, located at 19 Everett Alley where it intersects with South Stockton Street, and pick up a map/program for a self- or coordinator-guided tour.   Returning artistic or cultural venues displaying art are TerraCycle, with its walls covered with Jersey Jam-inspired graffiti; Latin American Legal Defense and Education Fund (LALDEF), showcasing artists in Trenton’s vibrant Hispanic Chambersburg neighborhood; Mill Hill Saloon’s exhibition by the Trenton Photo Club; the Blacksmith of Trenton, where a forge has operated since 1863; the New Jersey State Museum, offering fine art exhibitions and children’s projects; Trenton Community A-Team’s studio exhibition and sale; the 1719 William Trent House Museum; and more.   New venues include Shiloh Baptist Church, Freedom Skate Park, and Hanover Creative. New attractions include the refurbished public art installation of internationally known video artist Nam June Paik, new murals created by Trenton artists, and the artistic crosswalks painted at several city intersections.   The day ends with a reception at Artworks’ galleries from 6 to 8 p.m. featuring the Art All Day participating artist group show and a solo show by Trenton photographer Habiyb Shu’aib.   Events are generally free, but some events or activities may include a small fee to defray costs. Artists’ works will be for sale.   For more information or to link to a mobile site map, visit the Artworks website.  

SM Hanson Music is kicking off its instrument string recycling program with a free restringing and recycling event Saturday. What happens to old guitar strings once they are replaced? Quite often, they end up in the landfill. Rick Hanson and SM Hanson Music, Inc., want to do something about that. The longtime Salina music store is publicly kicking off its instrument string recycling program with a free recycle and restring event from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at the store, 335 South Clark Street. The event is sponsored by D’Addario® and international recycling company TerraCycle®. Old strings collected during the event will be recycled through Playback, D’Addario’s free, national recycling program. Playback is the world’s first instrument string recycling program, launched through a partnership between D’Addario and TerraCycle, a global leader in recycling typically non-recyclable waste. During Saturday’s event, musicians can have their electric or acoustic guitars restrung with new D’Addario XT Electric or XT Phospher Bronze Acoustic strings at no charge. With new strings and labor, that’s a value of more than $25 per guitar, Hanson said. Additionally, people can bring in any old instrument strings for recycling. A peek inside the the instrument string recycling box at SM Hanson Music, Inc. Hanson, who has served as president of SM Hanson Music, Inc., for the past three months, said that while the free restringing event is only on Saturday, the recycling effort will continue at no charge for any instrument strings. The store will even accept strings that are shipped to it from outside Salina, he said. “We’ve been searching for a solution for old string reuse after installing a new set on a guitar, so it’s great that D’Addario and TerraCycle are helping dealers confront this issue,” Hanson said. “Recycling these strings, regardless of brand-name, will help to greatly minimize our store’s landfill contribution.” Hanson said the Salina music store is one of three in Kansas that offers instrument string recycling services. SM Hanson Music, Inc., boasts a 47-year history of providing quality service and products for every musician – from beginner to expert. For all levels and ages, the full-service music store helps musicians find the right gear based on any budget, music taste, or experience level. With friendly and knowledgeable staff channeling more than 80 years of combined music teaching experience, S.M. Hanson Music, Inc.,  is a one-stop shop for instruments, gear, musical expertise, and even sound and video systems via their Sound Solutions Department. For more information about the guitar restringing and instrument string recycling event or other events offered by SM Hanson Music, Inc., check out the store’s Facebook page or website.  

Once Upon a Farm, the beloved kid nutrition brand that makes organic, cold-pressed baby food, smoothies, and applesauce, has expanded their partnership with international recycling company TerraCycle® to offer consumers a free, easy way to recycle packaging from their entire product line.      

• Participation in the Once Upon a Farm Recycling Program is easy. Simply sign up on the TerraCycle program page and mail in the packaging using a prepaid shipping label. Once collected, the packaging is cleaned and melted into hard plastic that can be remolded to make new recycled products. Additionally, for every pound of waste shipped to TerraCycle, collectors can earn $1 to donate to a non-profit, school or charitable organization of their choice.

    The Once Upon a Farm Recycling Program is open to any interested individual, school, office, or community organization. For more information on TerraCycle’s recycling program, visit www.terracycle.com.

A 3M passa a distribuir os displays da Scotch-Brite que contêm plástico vindo de esponjas recicladas pelo Programa Nacional de Reciclagem da marca, que serão implementados em lojas de todo o Brasil. Essa novidade é lançada no ano em que o programa completa cinco anos de existência, tendo coletado mais de 1,5 milhão de esponjas nesse período.

When trick-or-treaters show up at your door this Halloween, what are you going to give them?

 

Odds are good that you planned to pass out candy, but it wasn’t always that way. When trick-or-treating only gained popularity in the United States in the 1930s and ’40s, common trick-or-treat offerings included nuts, coins and homemade baked goods. Around the 1950s, candy companies decided to capitalize on the event. They spent decades making inroads on the holiday by downsizing candies into bite-sized packages and marketing them as treats for Halloween.

  Now, Halloween is an annual billion-dollar windfall for candy industry giants. According to the National Confectioners Association, Americans purchase nearly 600 million pounds of candy a year for Halloween.  

Even if everyone in the country is handing out king-sized candy bars (and any kid will tell you they are not), that’s a lot of candy wrappers. Most candy wrappers are made of mixed materials: coated paper, polypropylene film or a combination of aluminum and plastic, depending on the candy. It is not cost-effective for recycling companies to break down these tiny scraps of material that, ultimately, are too difficult to sell.

Every Halloween, millions of candy wrappers wind up in landfills. Talk about spooky.  

If you simply must have candy but are concerned about the waste, the company TerraCycle will accept candy-wrapper-waste through their Zero Waste Box program. Order a box (pricing ranges from $43 to $218, depending on the size), collect the waste and ship it back to TerraCycle, where they will separate the wrappers into its component parts for reuse.

There are other reasons to hand out something besides candy on Halloween aside from the waste, though. Besides the health and dental impact (the average trick-or-treater consumes about three cups of sugar on Halloween, which is 27 times the daily recommended amount), children with severe allergies are often excluded from the ghostly fun. The Food Allergy Research and Education organization started the Teal Pumpkin Project in 2014, encouraging households to hand out non-food treats (and indicate that they are doing so with a teal-painted pumpkin, flyer or sign on their porch or door) so that children with severe allergies can have a safe, fun Halloween.   Choosing alternatives to candy on Halloween can be tricky, though. Parents often tell children to toss homemade baked goods. Plus, one of the benefits of bite-sized candy is that it is cheap, and you can buy it in bulk.   If you are willing to be creative, though, there are plenty of non-candy options that your neighborhood trick-or-treaters will enjoy. Here are five alternatives to candy for a healthier, lower-waste and allergy-friendly Halloween.

Finger puppets

Halloween-themed finger puppets are easy to make out of recyclable and biodegradable materials. This DIY from the blog Easy, Peasy and Fun will help you make simple, spooky ghosts out of paper with your family before the festivities begin. Or you can also buy finger puppets in bulk.  

Crayons

Kids love coloring. Use soy wax, beeswax or bits of old crayons, melt them down in Halloween-themed molds and let them cool before handing them out to creative trick-or-treaters. You can even hand the crayons out with these printable Halloween finger puppet templates from the blog What We Do All Day for an extra-fun two-in-one gift.

 

Rope bracelets

Choose a colorful cord and quickly fashion these sliding knot bracelets using this DIY from the blog ManMade. Kids will be scrambling over each other to choose their favorite colors. Hopefully, they will sport their new bracelets for the rest of their trick-or-treating adventures and beyond.

 

Miniature gourds

What is more autumnal than a miniature gourd? Stop by your local farmers market or grocery store to pick up a bulk bag of miniature pumpkins and gourds to hand out to trick or treaters. Kids will love the funny shapes and can keep them on display all season long (as an added bonus, they are both biodegradable and compostable).  

Seed packets

Pique neighborhood kids’ interest in gardening by handing out packets of seeds instead of candy. Even if they cannot plant them until spring, a packet of pumpkins will stay in the Halloween spirit while encouraging kids to ask questions about gardening. Biodegradable, plantable seed paper cut out in Halloween shapes is also a fun option. Mixes with pollinator-friendly flowers are easy to grow and will benefit the whole neighborhood.

 

When trick-or-treaters ring your doorbell this Halloween, surprise them with any of these more sustainable alternatives to bite-sized candy. Their molars, their parents and the planet will thank you.

20 Nassau Sold to Hotel Developer

An iconic office building at the corner of Nassau and Chambers streets has been sold to a hotel developer, according to reporting by Planet Princeton as well as property records. The building at 20 Nassau Street — pictured above —is home to more than 100 small businesses including doctors, psychologists, social workers, consultants, startups, lawyers, architects, and various others. The building has retailers and restaurants, such as Jammin’ Crepes, at street level. Property records indicate the building was sold on October 24 to a company called GPNJ, and Planet Princeton reported the contact was listed as Benjamin Weprin, the owner of Graduate Hotels, a company that builds nostalgia-themed hotels in college towns. A New York Times profile described Weprin as a swaggering “brotelier” whose 11 existing hotels cater to alumni, college-shopping families, and helicopter parents.

Terracycle Partners with Gerber

Baby food manufacturer Gerber has partnered with Trenton-based international recycling company TerraCycle to provide a way to recycle packaging that would otherwise end up in a landfill. Some of Gerber’s products are not recyclable under some municipal recycling programs. Parents can sign up on the Gerber Recycling Program page at www.terracycle.com/en-US/brigades/gerber and mail in packaging that is not municipally recyclable using a prepaid shipping label. Once collected the packaging is cleaned and melted into hard plastic that can be remolded to make new recycled products. “Through this free recycling program, Gerber is offering parents an easy way to divert waste from landfills by providing a responsible way to dispose of certain hard-to-recycle baby food packaging,” said TerraCycle CEO and founder Tom Szaky. “By collecting and recycling these items, families can demonstrate their respect for the environment not only through the products that they choose for their children, but also with how they dispose of the packaging.” For every pound of packaging waste sent to TerraCycle through the Gerber Recycling Program, collectors can earn $1 to donate to a non-profit, school, or charitable organization of their choice. “We’re thrilled to partner with TerraCycle as part of our broader sustainable packaging efforts,” said Gerber president and CEO Bill Partyka. “Our commitment to sustainability is rooted in giving parents a hand in making their baby’s future that much brighter.” The Gerber Recycling Program is open to any interested individual, school, office, or community organization. TerraCycle, 121 New York Avenue, Trenton 08638. 609-393-4252. Tom Szaky, CEO. www.terracycle.com.

Deaths

Rita Pintimalli, 89, on October 24. Together with her husband, she owned and operated Country Gardens in Robbinsville. She previously owned and operated Quakerbridge Gardens and Continental Coffers in Hamilton. Jack M. Conley, 76, on October 22. He was a senior research scientist at American Cyanamid Company. Edward M. Lawrence, 72, on October 19. He was a CPA with his own practice, Lawrence & Hilem, in Princeton, for more than 30 years. Charles A. Lynch, 84, on October 15. He led a long career in the chemical industry that included working in research for FMC in Princeton and retiring as an account executive for the state Department Of Commerce. Samuel Hynes, 95, on October 10. He was a professor of literature at Princeton best known for his 1988 memoir, “Flights of Passage,” which recounts his time as a bomber pilot in the Pacific theater of World War II. He was also a literary critic, writing for the New Yorker, the New York Times, and other publications.

VANCOUVER – Thought leaders, innovators and global brands will converge on Vancouver over the next two days for the ninth annual Zero Waste Conference, hosted by Metro Vancouver.   The 2019 Zero Waste Conference brings change-makers and innovators from different sectors and around the globe to share their insights and winning strategies.   The two-day forum will highlight successes, pitfalls and opportunities as businesses and communities shift to zero waste principals, through in-depth sessions on business model transformation, plastics, design innovation and circular cities.   TIME AND LOCATION Wednesday, October 30: 8:45 a.m. – 4:45 p.m. Thursday, October 31: 8:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.   Vancouver Convention Centre East, 999 Canada Place Vancouver, BC V6C 3C1   SPEAKERS INCLUDE:  

• Opening Keynote Skylar Tibbits – Founder of the Self-Assembly Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Skylar will provoke audiences to radically reimagine how we use materials and interact with products in our daily lives – his vision is a world where buildings, products and machines are capable of self-assembly, repair and replication, without robotic parts.
• Closing Keynote Valerie Craig – Deputy to the Chief Scientist and Vice President of Operating Programs, National Geographic Society, Valerie will amplify the great challenges presented by plastics waste, questioning how we got here and discovering potential solutions that will require global thinking and human ingenuity.
• Harald Friedl, CEO, Circle Economy – Harald will share insights on how to accelerate the global transition to a circular economy: can it be the key to tackle the climate crisis, biodiversity loss and diminishing resources?
• Arthur Huang – With a vision where everything from consumer goods to buildings is made from recycled materials, Arthur is singlehandedly accelerating the shift to the circular economy. Through his company Miniwiz, he has created TRASHPRESSO, a portable, solar-powered recycling platform that turns plastic into new products in only ten minutes.
• Tom Szaky – The founder of TerraCycle and Loop, Tom presents a new way of shopping that eliminates single-use packaging. In Loop, products are delivered directly to customers in durable containers that are then collected and refilled at least a hundred times before being recycled.
• The conference also welcomes as speakers executives from Subaru, Unilever, Nature’s Path Foods, Canadian Tire, Ellen MacArther Foundation, The Finnish Innovation Fund: SITRA, Ocean Wise, City of Helsinki, Smart Prosperity Institute, Arup Canada, Cascades Recovery+, The Natural Step Canada, Recyc-Quebec, Metabolic, Recycling Council of Alberta, and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.