PPS Offers Green Alternative in Returnable Packaging

27 May 2009

As owners as well as managers of a large fleet of returnable transit equipment, in the form of crates, boxes and pallets, PPS cannot afford to have their working assets “lost” in the field. For that reason at the start-up of PPS the management instituted a robust policy of ensuring that anyone handling their equipment takes responsibility for it and they sign a Customers Agreement Form to that effect. In the early days of operations a small number of customers simply “forgot” they had signed this Agreement and lost, misused and in certain cases even sold some of the PPS equipment. The policy of PPS then and now is to vigorously pursue anyone deliberately breaching the terms of the Customer Agreement.

One particular customer PPS worked with towards conversion from cardboard boxes was a large poultry producer in Scotland. This customer had been sending out raw poultry products throughout the UK in cardboard boxes and had been following this practice for some years. PPS proposed the use of a nestable plastic crate having dimensions very close to that of the previously used cardboard box.

The trials were an immediate success on a number of fronts – the plastic crates were more robust than the cardboard boxes and during transport remained rigid whereas it was quite common for the lower levels of cardboard boxes to crush in the event of sudden braking of the transport vehicle. This meant that less of the meat had to be rejected due to spoiling of the carrier medium – i.e. the cardboard box.

An added advantage that arose out of the initial trials, and not one either PPS or the customer had foreseen was that instead of packing the normal 15kgs of meat per cardboard box 19kgs could be loaded into the PPS plastic crate, thus meaning fewer plastic crates were needed to transport the same weight of meat – another contribution towards the reduction of the Product Carbon Footprint.

In this particular example the combination of fewer plastic crates required and no need to dispose of used cardboard boxes, not only improved the PCF but critically resulted in a 12% cost reduction on a single trip basis.

Whilst there is no general rule to follow on direct comparisons, one of the UK’s leading crate manufacturers estimates that a standard plastic nestable crate as used by PPS will, over a five year period complete around 92 return trips. Even at the end of its active life cycle PPS has a use for the crates (and pallets) – these are sold back to a recycling company who grind up the products which can then be used to partly produce new plastic parts.

Another way to examine the advantages of plastic versus one-way trip cardboard boxes is the study carried out that shows that replacing disposable packaging with plastic returnable equipment will often pay for itself after only around 12 trips and generates considerable financial savings for our customers.

A number of potential customers would like to move to RTP but are put off by what seems to be a considerable upfront initial financial outlay. Although long-term it may make considerable financial sense to move to RTP there may not be the capital expenditure budget to meet the need.

This is where PPS steps in – not only will they supply the equipment, but manage it, wash it and repair it on behalf of clients.

Iain McArthur, Director of PPS said “We were promoting the advantages of Product Carbon Footprinting even before we knew the term existed! When we started operations a number of years ago we were aware of environmental issues connected with disposal of cardboard, but we primarily promoted our services based on a cost-efficient financial model. In other words our customers wanted to save money. We feel we now offer the advantage of not only helping customers take some cost out of their businesses, but we promote the feel-good contribution of helping to decrease the carbon footprint”.