B&Q, the UK's biggest garden retailer, has revolutionised the way it packages bedding plants. Its "easyGrow" technology banishes polystyrene trays, and uses a coir pith-based growing medium wrapped in a "teabag" of fully compostable corn starch. It will be available in its 360 stores from April 2014.
Customers who tested the product loved that fragile plants can be removed easily, without the root damage that usually goes with polystyrene trays.
Planting is easier because the self-contained bags can be planted straight into the soil. And translucent trays are designed so they can be re-used to grow more plants, put together to form a propagator or recycled with normal household recycling.
B&Q estimates that replacing the polystyrene pack will lead to 50% less packaging and customers will neither diminish finite resources nor produce any waste. The coir pith and teabag netting compost safely in the garden.
B&Q sells over 14m packs a year, so improving the sustainability credentials of its bedding plants matters.
The company developed easygrow working closely with Coletta & Tyson, its UK-based bedding plant grower, and sustainability partner BioRegional. Between them they took into account every aspect of the product lifecycle, from the extraction of raw materials to manufacturing and impacts from transport, re-use and end-of-life disposal.
The result is innovative packaging that is fully recyclable and provides customers with good quality, easy-to-use plants.
Lorna Thorpe is part of the wordworks network
The Guardian Sustainable Business Sustainability Case Studies contain articles on all the initiatives that met the criteria for the GSB Awards.
