Being "green" is one of our most important missions at Whole Foods Market! Our Whole Body team, along with some of our biggest vendors, has been hard at work developing sustainable packaging standards requirements for all of the products we sell in Whole Body, including our own 365 Everyday Value™ and Whole Foods™ brands. Enacting change by setting clear environmental packaging guidelines has the potential to alleviate environmental strain, reduce our carbon foot print and lead the way for other manufacturers to make these changes as well. Helping the planet while we help our customers find the best there is in supplements and body care!Our Whole Foods brand of supplements is the number one selling supplement brand in our Whole Body departments. We have worked with our manufacturer to source a new 100% Post-Consumer Recycled (PCR) content plastic bottle for those Whole Foods products that are currently sold in the amber plastic PET #1 bottles. Post-consumer recycled content bottles are made from other bottles that have been recycled. 100% PCR content bottles use less energy and water to produce. They generate far fewer greenhouse gases, while also diverting reusable materials out of the landfill and reducing our reliance on virgin petrochemicals. By some estimates, 100% PCR PET has a carbon footprint that is 60% smaller than virgin plastic. It is important to note that our manufacturer is using PCR sources that are FDA approved and safe for food contact-providing the same barrier characteristics and shelf life of our previous bottles. They have identified multiple sources for this high quality PCR source resin and all of our products in PET #1 bottles will transition to this new material. And after you use the high quality Whole Foods brand supplements inside, toss the empty bottle in for your community recycling program to re-use again and again. These bottles can be recycled repeatedly for a substantial impact on total carbon emissions over the life of the plastic. We are starting to convert products to the new bottles now, as we produce them, and expect the full product line of PET #1 bottles to be transitioned by late in 2010. Finding the new bottles is easy. The labels have a leaf with this symbol on it:
Reducing virgin plastic consumption and still allowing for recyclability. Those are ideas we can all support!
