Plastic components are heavily employed in different sectors and packaging is the one sector which
contributes the most to primary plastic production (source: Plastics Europe).
SIPA, as technological leader in PET containers solutions for food, beverage, chemical products and detergents packaging, pays a great deal of attention to innovation ideas for a more sustainable future, with a closer look especially at the packaging sector.
Plastics are SIPA’s core business and the awareness around plastic pollution and the impact of its
chemical components on human health and the environment raises quite some urgency in shifting
towards a more environmental-friendly business. Even though plastic recycling is commonly
perceived as the eco-friendly way of dealing with plastics, this is not enough anymore. Only a small portion of the plastics we recycle ends up in newly produced plastic-based products, for this reason SIPA has set the goal to go the extra mile and convert part of its core business to the production of reusable containers. In order to get started from an impactful part of the business the selected products are detergent bottles, reason for that is the amount of plastic that end up in the final product and the great potential for achieving benefits along their whole product life-cycle (source: Case study on detergent bottles).
For SIPA converting this part of the business into reusable containers doesn’t only mean re-thinking
production facilities and processes but also taking into account the stakeholders involved along the
product life-cycle, considering both the environmental and costing aspects of the life-cycle. That is
why the company has decided to implement 2 main actions in FY24:
1. Convert current detergent bottles production process into reusable detergent bottles which
aim to have:
a. lower material use
b. lower impact along the production process
c. longer-living characteristics for reusability purposes
2. Involve partners who are willing to embrace change along the product life-cycle.
With respect to the first objective, SIPA has already moved the first steps by identifying the
methodologies to tackle points a., b. and c. thanks to extensive research conducted within the R&D
department and supported by academic research too. Currently, the company has announced to
invest 5 Mln € for the conversion of the old detergent bottles production to the more eco-friendly ones. SIPA aims at being production ready in 1 year from now, which would then raise 2 possibilities:
should the eco-friendly bottles follow the same steps of the rest of the life-cycle (namely ‘Use’ and
‘End-of-use’) or should the innovation embark additional partners along a bigger journey?
With the second target mentioned above, SIPA aims at involving stakeholders along the value chain of detergent bottles. For this reason, the company announced the partnership with 3 key supermarket chains: Aldi, Carrefour and Conad and the collaboration with the association of representatives of detergent producers in EU. These stakeholders confirmed they will support the value creation in detergent bottles life-cycle by providing detergent tanks in supermarkets where customers will be able to refill their bottles and by creating the needed infrastructure for the collection of reusable containers at home to make them available again to consumers while shopping.
The idea behind this is that the consumer will no longer throw away the empty detergent bottles but
refill the reusable containers directly in the supermarket. The advantage for the consumer is not only the lower price for shopping detergents but also the ‘feel good’ mechanism which will incentivize
adhering to this sustainable initiative. From an environmental perspective, there’s also an advantage
in the distribution of the products because 1 tonne of detergent can be transported in 1 container with 1 trip whereas if it was stored in detergent bottles it would have to employ 2 trips for the same amount of raw product. Looking at the Environmental Life Cycle Analysis, there’s a clear advantage along each step of the value chain.
These stakeholders agreed to kick off the initiative in 3 countries: Italy, Germany and France, with the
aim of involving a minimum of 50 supermarkets in each country. For the collection of empty
containers at home SIPA and the other partners are currently involving the local entities who are
typically involved in trash collection. With this fourth stakeholder the cycle would easily close and
generate value in each step of the chain.
When we look at this shift it feels like moving from a strategy focused on being reactive (fostering
recycling of plastic products), to a more proactive and creative approach, by starting new virtuous
trends thanks to innovative ways of tackling the needs of consumers. Taking the iceberg model as a
reference, we can say SIPA has identified a strategy to move from the surface ‘events’ level to the
‘systemic structures and mindsets’ level with an intermediate step tackling the ‘patterns of behavior’.
The conversion into more eco-friendly bottles would lower the amount of plastic used in the final
products and also improve the environmental impact of the production process, this first step would
help the company be more proactive and limit the impacts already known. But moving towards the
involvement of stakeholders along the value chain means being more creative and defining an
intervention at the root cause level, namely being at the deepest level of the iceberg model.
Author: Student of MBA Sustainability Management Class 1 (2023-2025)
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