Off the bat, one point to mention in terms of Get Loose interventions in our supply chain is our part in working with Clean Bean Tofu to use home compostable packaging instead of plastic. This change accounts for 14.6kg of waste savings per year!

As with the Non-Food Blog above this is a list of our suppliers current waste prevention practices.

(to find out more about some of these suppliers, click on their name to be taken to the Producer Spotlight)

Aeithalis Olive Oil Greece

The oil arrives in the UK in a tanker lorry. This is then transferred to 20 litre drums. These 20 litre drums are delivered and the empty ones collected in a electric vehicle : )

Carley’s Cornwall
This lovely supplier uses recycled glass for their spreads and condiments. They have been researching making it easier to remove labels from jars an important step in the enabling of glassware reuse.

They reduced the thickness of their plastic covers used to transport jars This means less plastic used throughout their many stockist UK wide. They have also researched labels and recycling plastic consequently they do not glue labels to packaging. This makes it easier to separate and recycle individually. We have approached Carley’s about returning used jars to them for cleaning and refilling but they didn’t have the capacity to do so at the time and where particularly concerned with the safety around glass chipping.

Clean Bean Tofu Brick Lane- London
The charming Neil drives over to the shop from Brick Lane. Tofu comes in home compostable ‘no frills’ packaging. This is 10g lighter than their normal plastic packaging. Swapped to home compostable wrapping to fulfill Get Loose values.

In one years sales we have saved 14.6kg of waste with this swap. This is potentially more as this does not account for those customers who have been able to home compost.

Karma Drinks UK made
These bottles can be returned for use in the shop Bottle Bank. They are very popular for those in need of some emergency vinegar or oil! They arrive with other items from main wholesaler Infinity Foods (workers Cooperative)

Local Honey Man Hackney- London
Jars can be returned to the shop by customers. These are collected and returned to the producer for cleaning and refill.

Mango Burkina Faso, then Brighton for packaging at Infinity
Drying mango helps preserve the glut of mangos at harvest time. Dried mango keeps longer and is easier to transport to other countries. Vacuum packed to keep fresh and safe during transport.

Minor Figures - East London.
These peeps have a Bag In Box (BIB) system reduces the need for single use packaging. BIB bags are returned to producers (10 at a time) for recycling in specialist facilities. Delivery is by our main supplier Infinity Foods Cooperative

Mont58 - South London
Bags are delivered by individual courier, saved and returned for reuse. The bags arrive in cardboard boxes.

Niko B Organic Chocolates - Newington Green
The lovely Anthony delivers us his awesome chocs and biscuits in returnable / reusable containers via taxi. He collects the empties as he delivers the fresh batches.

Palace Culture - South London
Jars can be donated to the shop Jar Bank. Palace Culture deliver to us via a courier. There is cardboard and plastic cool packs which unfortunately are thrown away in the landfill bin

Rookery Farm Eggs West Sussex(
Egg boxes can be returned to the shop. The farm uses them to sell their own eggs. However the farm hens only lay a couple of boxes a day. Many returned egg boxes are put on the compost heap or recycled. The big carboard boxes that the 30 x 6 eggs boxes are delivered in are returned to Rookery Farm for reuse.

Sunflower Family -Germany
This product is a bi-product of the sunflower oil industry. They use the husks of sunflowers to power local house close to their factory in Germany.

Zantye Cashew Nuts - Goa, India
This awesome company is a please to work with. They sell broken nuts at a reduced price. They also cite that cashews grown in Goa are the least wasteful in terms of land use as the ground is the most fertile there compared to other cashew growing regions in the world. It arrives in vacuum packed bags (needed to keep nuts fresh and safe on journey) inside cardboard boxes.

Areas for improvement/Research

Palace Culture
Can the plastic/cardboard waste be reduced on these peeps deliveries? Is saving and sending their packaging back to them for reuse carbon neutral and cost neutral?

Furthermore does it make sense for Palace culture to team up with Clean Bean for their wholesale deliveries on a cargo bike? Would there be extra cost involved in this logistical amendment.

Niko B
Could NikoB sell broken chocolates, or chocolate chips?

Sunflower Mince
Could we link up the Sunflower Family with a UK wholesaler such as the Infinity Foods Cooperative. This could save on the outer cardboard packaging and individual transport trips

Eggs
Egg boxes could be offered to gardeners as seed trays / compost material.

Mango
Currently vacuum packed in 1kg bags. This we believe is with the intention to keep it as fresh as possible. We also believe that due to high volume sales this product could come in 2kg-5kg bags and still keep fresh. Increasing bag size could have a huge waste saving. We shall investigate.

Pasta
Likewise with mango above pasta comes in a 6kg or 3kg bag. Could we persuade suppliers to increase case sizes?

General
Understand the CO2 emissions and life cycle analysis of different types of packaging in production, transportation and recycling.

Next stage

Our next supply chain blog post on food items will detail how we get on with investigating and implementing the above areas for improvements.