Looks like I wasn't the only customer complaining...
According to www.cleanari.org, Americans throw away 2.5 MILLION plastic bottles every hour, yuck. There are many different numbers out about the waste plastic bottles cause, all of them crazy numbers. I am still saddened by Bossa Nova's decision to turn to plastic.
Although I do not agree with their arguments of turning to plastic, it only reminds me that buying FRESH and LOCAL is key. I am eliminating as much un-local items as I can, my Bossa Nova elimination will be the next on my list ;) I still firmly believe that glass, as a completely renewable packing resource, is much better then plastic. I will still seek out companies to stick by this belief. I will always choose Local, then glass and only if I have to, plastic.....
For your pleasure, here is the letter I was sent:
"Hello Amber,
Thank you for writing with your concerns – we really want and encourage our customers opinions, suggestions and feedback.
Please know that our decision to switch from glass to PET plastic was not born of a cost savings potential. We are always looking for ways to reduce our environmental impact and we try and be conscious of not only what we put into our products but also consider where the various constituents come from, how they were attained and what it took energy-wise to get it to us.
Glass vs plastic. At first there wasn’t too much to think about, we have an extensive understanding of not only natural products but also a deep appreciation, meaning we walk the walk - and with that understanding was a knowledge that glass was better than plastic. And many of our customers thanked us for choosing glass packaging.
Then, in the latter part 2007, some of those calls and email started to change in opinion and appreciation of glass bottles. We started getting questioned as to why we were in glass bottles, if we are a company that cares about the environment - and being asked if we knew what the carbon impact was of the heavier, less recycled and more energy intensive glass bottles.
So we started looking into carbon impact, the sustainability of our glass supply, the manufacturing process, transportation drag and recyclabilty and found that a lot of this new information we were hearing was correct – now we had some serious consideration to give in our bottle choice.
It was a difficult decision. Do we stay in glass, a completely recyclable product but one that is not recycled as much (percentage-wise or life cycles), is heavier and therefore has more of a carbon-impact as far as transporting goes and also needs a lot more energy to produce. Or do we go with plastic which is is a petrol product but is lighter and actually uses less overall petrol when you weigh the considerably higher fuel needs of manufacturing and moving around heavier glass.
Our decision was, at least until there are better alternatives to current fuel options, that the best choice would be plastic (PET.)
I should also mention that we also took into consideration some people’s concern about the possibility of plastic leeching – especially when when plastic becomes heated. We decided that if we were not able to bottle our juice in a way that avoided it coming into contact with heated plastic, we would not have moved forward with the new process. Our product is kept cold from the point it goes in the bottle to when it hits your lips. We have chosen PET 1 as it is shown to be a stable plastic in regards to any potential of leaching when used appropriately.
I hope this helps explain our reasoning for the switch – and I hope that it meets your satisfaction.
Best,
Mike Steele"
Keep it glass
