Food and Beverage Companies Go Green

Similarly, changing the case configurations for Progresso soup removed 2,000 tons of steel from Progresso’s annual steel input total, reducing costs and making lighter cans, which consumers prefer.

Reducing impact on landfills

Kraft Foods, (www.kraftfoods.com) Northfield, Ill., focuses on six areas that impact the environment: agricultural commodities, packaging, energy, water, waste, and transportation and distribution. Since 2001, the company has measured key environmental performance indicators (EPIs): water consumption, energy usage, energy-related carbon dioxide emissions, solid waste generation and recycling rates.

As of 2007, the recycling rate for its manufacturing facilities was nearly 90 percent. Globally, the company has decreased water consumption by 34 percent, carbon dioxide emissions by 30 percent, energy consumption by 25 percent and solid waste generated by 16 percent.

Closer to home, Kraft has partnered with TerraCycle, (www.terracycle.net) an upstart Trenton, N.J., firm, which takes packages and materials that are challenging to recycle and turns them into handbags, umbrellas and other products.

Schools, community groups and other non-profits collect specific used packages. TerraCycle then “upcycles” each material into an eco-friendly product. One program collects used energy bar wrappers and donates two cents each to the collecting organization. Wrappers are braided into durable purses and backpacks. Another uses Nabisco cookie wrappers, which are fused together into sheets of waterproof fabric, which are then made into umbrellas, shower curtains, backpacks, placemats and other products. The third program reuses drink pouches, which are sewn into tote bags, handbags and other durable items.

Several Kraft brands, including Balance bars and South Beach Living bars, Capri Sun beverages and Chips Ahoy! and Oreo cookies, are now the lead sponsors of TerraCycle Brigades.

Stonyfield: Pioneering greenie

As far back as 1983, Stonyfield Farm (www.stonyfield.com) co-founders Samuel Kaymen and president/CEO Gary Hirshberg created a mission statement “to serve as a model that environmentally and socially responsible businesses can also be profitable.”