Kraft Foods Starts New Year 150 Million Pounds Lighter
Kraft Foods starts the new year 150 million pounds (116 million kilograms) leaner -- having 
eliminated enough material from its supply chain since 2005 to exceed the company's packaging reduction goal two years ahead of schedule.
"Our global team of employees is doing a phenomenal job creating opportunities to reduce packaging material while assuring convenience and safety," says Jean Spence, executive vice president, Research, Development & Quality. "We've invented a tool to help us design more efficiently. And we're finding smarter source materials, reducing our footprint and thinking differently about packaging end of life. We're sharing ideas, challenging and motivating one another, so this is truly a collaborative team effort.
For example, in the United Kingdom, Kraft Foods recently began selling Kenco coffee in refill bags to complement glass jars. The refill bags use 97 percent less packaging material by weight than a new jar and less energy in the packaging conversion process.
Also, in the United States, consumer recycling rates are only 33 percent, but in other parts of the world those numbers are closer to 70 percent. In 2008, to help increase recycling rates in the United States, Kraft Foods began partnering with RecycleBank, a company that rewards consumers for recycling. The more recycling a consumer does, the more reward points they have to redeem -- and the less waste that goes to landfill. It has helped people recycle more than 400,000 tons of material, saving the equivalent of 4.3 million trees and 280,000 gallons of oil.
In 2008, Kraft Foods started partnering with TerraCycle, a company that "upcycles" material that otherwise would've gone to a landfill. TerraCycle reuses packaging to make new, useful products. Today, Kraft Foods is the largest sponsor of TerraCycle "brigades" -- collection points -- with more than 30,000 Kraft Foods-sponsored locations and nearly seven million people signed up to collect waste across the United States at these locations. The program has expanded internationally to the United Kingdom and Canada, and there's more in the works.
eliminated enough material from its supply chain since 2005 to exceed the company's packaging reduction goal two years ahead of schedule. "Our global team of employees is doing a phenomenal job creating opportunities to reduce packaging material while assuring convenience and safety," says Jean Spence, executive vice president, Research, Development & Quality. "We've invented a tool to help us design more efficiently. And we're finding smarter source materials, reducing our footprint and thinking differently about packaging end of life. We're sharing ideas, challenging and motivating one another, so this is truly a collaborative team effort.
For example, in the United Kingdom, Kraft Foods recently began selling Kenco coffee in refill bags to complement glass jars. The refill bags use 97 percent less packaging material by weight than a new jar and less energy in the packaging conversion process.
Also, in the United States, consumer recycling rates are only 33 percent, but in other parts of the world those numbers are closer to 70 percent. In 2008, to help increase recycling rates in the United States, Kraft Foods began partnering with RecycleBank, a company that rewards consumers for recycling. The more recycling a consumer does, the more reward points they have to redeem -- and the less waste that goes to landfill. It has helped people recycle more than 400,000 tons of material, saving the equivalent of 4.3 million trees and 280,000 gallons of oil.
In 2008, Kraft Foods started partnering with TerraCycle, a company that "upcycles" material that otherwise would've gone to a landfill. TerraCycle reuses packaging to make new, useful products. Today, Kraft Foods is the largest sponsor of TerraCycle "brigades" -- collection points -- with more than 30,000 Kraft Foods-sponsored locations and nearly seven million people signed up to collect waste across the United States at these locations. The program has expanded internationally to the United Kingdom and Canada, and there's more in the works.