Addressing Compostability Confusion for BlueStripe™ Products

When we launched our BlueStripe™ line of products made with post-consumer recycled content over a decade ago, we had no idea the extent to which the Eco-Products name and brand would become synonymous with compostability.

In some respects, this is a great honor and a testament to all the work we’ve done over the years to bring attention to the unique ability of the compostable products we make to help keep food waste out of landfills.

The problem is that we made the decision early on to put the Eco-Products brand name on each new BlueStripe product we rolled out, not realizing we would be setting the stage for some high consequence confusion in the years to come.

Since the initial BlueStripe launch, the number of composters accepting food scraps and compostable packaging has increased considerably, and so too have the number of front-of-house composting programs across the foodservice world. All of this happened without a corresponding increase in consumer education around what is compostable and what is not, and without industry standards for on-product labeling to help guide point of disposal decision making. And to top it all off, most composters have an extremely limited ability to deal with contamination cost effectively when it enters their facilities.

The unfortunate result of all of this is that some composters have been forced to stop accepting even certified compostable products due to their inability to handle contamination from non-compostable products.

Contamination mitigation is now priority one in almost all of the downstream work we do. We even launched an open-source program for systematic contamination mitigation called CIRC that is available to all free of charge whether you are an Eco-Products customer or not.

As soon as it became clear that the Eco-Products brand name was signaling compostability on BlueStripe products, we put a plan in place to change the artwork. If you know anything about how that works with the products we make, you know that it doesn’t happen all at once, and we are currently in the midst of a rolling change to all BlueStripe product artwork.

BlueStripe cold cups and many of our WorldView lids have been updated, and are making their way into the market now. Next up will be BlueStripe hot cup lids.

Thanks for your support as we work through these important changes!