Amazon has today revealed a new paper-padded envelope with shock-absorbent lining designed to be recycled through standard kerbside collection services, as part of its on-going push to avoid unnecessary packaging wherever possible.
Developed by the retail giant’s scientists and engineers alongside packaging industry expert Mondi, the new envelopes protect deliveries without using any plastic content, providing a replacement for widely-used bubble wrap.
According to Amazon, its latest envelopes are designed to absorb stress put on the package during its journey to customers’ homes, and fulfil customer demand for rightsized, recyclable packaging that minimises waste and ensures damage-free delivery.
Available in three sizes, the new envelope gets its strength from the specially engineered lightweight paper used for the outer package paired with a only a few millimetres of corrugate inner lining. The design also features multiple ridges, allowing the packaging to fold around its contents in a way that makes it simple and quick to pack.
Due to its lightweight lining, the package itself is also lighter than equivalent-sized cardboard boxes, avoiding 44g of packaging per shipment on average, the company said.
“Amazon stopped using traditional bubble-wrap padded envelopes in Europe several years ago, which presented a challenge to develop light, flexible and fully recyclable paper packaging that provides the same protection,” said Thais Blumer, European head of sustainable packaging for Amazon.
“Achieving both low weight and maximum protection with a 100 per cent recyclable paper envelope was not an easy task, but these envelopes are easy to pack, simple for customers to recycle at home, and enable damage-free deliveries.”
According to the update, more than half of Amazon European shipments now come in reduced, recyclable delivery packaging, such as a paper bag or cardboard envelopes or, in the case of 700 million shipments since 2019, no added packaging at all through Amazon’s Ships in Product Packaging programme.
These measures mean Amazon can fit more packages into every van, leading to fewer journeys and helping to reduce emissions in support of the retail giant’s goal of achieving net zero by 2040.
Since 2015, Amazon has reduced packaging per-shipment weight by 43 per cent, representing more than three million metric tons of packaging materials avoided.
“Together with Amazon, we spent several months testing our designs, evaluating various padding options such as honeycomb and embossed bubble paper,” said Pedro Cuesta, a packaging engineer from Mondi. “Ultimately, open-flute padding – a flat paper sheet attached to a sheet of ridged paper – proved to be the best solution.
“Creating a plastic-free padded mailer for ecommerce packaging has been an exciting collaborative journey towards a more sustainable future. We are proud that Amazon customers all over Europe could soon be receiving orders in these envelopes.”
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