Whether gathered around a boardroom table or browsing the aisles of a local
neighborhood supermarket, our experiences provide clues and insights into the
future of sustainability and commerce.
In fact, our grocery stores can be indicators of many larger trends in our
economic landscape. Bare shelves suggest supply chain fragmentation, closed
checkout lanes hint at labor issues, and an abundance of healthy snacks show
greater health consciousness by our food brands. Most recently, rising prices
reveal dramatic inflation. Grocery stores can serve as future-forward maps for
sustainable transitions in consumer packaged goods (CPG).
While discussions at
Davos
have predicated trends for the coming year, Dow and
Fast Company recently gathered leaders from McKinsey, Unilever and
Colgate-Palmolive to ponder what our grocery stores will look like in 2035
and beyond. At our Sustainability Next
Summit,
leaders discussed how to fulfill consumer desires for recyclable product
packaging in a way that supports scale and the need to balance consumer
convenience.
As Dow’s Chief Sustainability Officer, I am guided by customer-centric
collaboration that allows us to deliver innovation and ingenuity — pushing our
industry to the forefront of low-carbon, circular solutions. Through
conversations we heard from leaders at our Sustainability Next Summit, as well
as at other forums such as Davos and UN COPs for
climate,
I have continued to hear themes of collaboration, meeting customers where they
are and phasing in
reuse
— which will help the CPG sector and beyond to not only map the future, but also
shape it, in real time, starting today.
From cooperation to competition and back again
The circular packaging solutions that wind up on store shelves will require
input from the entire industrial ecosystem. Optimizing for sustainability
requires behind-the-scenes collaboration to solve innovation challenges in
materials,
design
and supply chain
management.
In the interest of uniformity and broader infrastructure transformation, this
often means competitors working together.
Thankfully, many CPG and packaging companies — including Unilever and
Colgate-Palmolive — are working together to create scale and consistency through
coalitions and trade associations such as the Consumer Goods
Forum (CGF). Additionally,
Colgate-Palmolive participates in CGF’s Plastic Waste Coalition of
Action,
which is focused on the development of nine “golden design rules” that will
allow companies to pre-competitively align on packaging development. As a
result, future innovation will have design for recyclability embedded into
development DNA and will make it easier for consumers to reuse and recycle.
Meeting consumers where they are
The biggest determinant of success is the ability of the industry to bridge the
“say-do”
gap.
Studies show that upwards
of 65 percent of consumers want to live more sustainably, including buying from
sustainable brands; yet only 20-30 percent act on this desire.
In today’s recycling system, there’s no shortage of confusion about what can and
can’t be recycled, where and how materials should be disposed of and which
products and packaging are made sustainably. For this reason, I believe
transparency will be the future of the sustainable shelf and key to closing the
say-do gap.
Disposal instructions and material origins may soon be as prominent on packaging
as brand logos. We should expect shoppers to examine labels before mindlessly
dropping items in their carts. Whether directly visible on packaging or
accessible through a QR code, this information will be invaluable to consumers
looking for more sustainable brands.
The phasing in of reuse
This integration of packaging transparency won’t be the only noticeable shift to
store shelves. Another that I am particularly excited to see is greater
investment in solutions that encourage reuse. Many products and packaging of the
future will not only be recyclable and made of recycled materials, but also
reusable.
Take Colgate’s Keep Toothbrush as an
example: Consumers buy aluminum toothbrush bases and buy replacements for only
the heads of the brushes, as needed. Products such as these divert waste from
landfills and are not reliant on widespread implementation of advanced recycling
to do so. Plus, the simplicity for consumers tackles the issue of inaction.
Visualizing shelves of the future
As I’ve said before, the future will — in many ways — be different than what we
see today; Sustainability Next Summit panelists all agreed that our shelves will
be transformed over the next 10-15 years. And, while it may take years for the
trickle-down effect to rewrite the shopping experience, I find it encouraging to
see companies joining us in the collective journey toward a circular,
sustainable world.
View all panels from the Sustainability Next Summit
here.
Chief Sustainability Officer and VP of EH&S
Dow
Published Feb 9, 2023 7am EST / 4am PST / 12pm GMT / 1pm CET