Shipping from Italy abroad without plastic? Here is our green story!

Have you ever thought about the huge impact that plastic packaging used in shipping has on the environment?
At Vico Food Box, we’ve thought about it a lot: the environment and sustainability are topics we truly care about.
That’s why we decided to roll up our sleeves and do what seemed right to us:

• eliminate plastic packaging from our shipments;

• replace plastic with recycled paper and cardboard materials.

In this article, we’ll tell you about our ideas and how we put this green initiative into practice—something we are very proud of.

Plastic packaging in shipping
Plastic: a material with low recycling performance
Our values: sustainability
Our story of eco-friendly shipping (plastic-free packaging)

Plastic packaging in shipping

Every day, millions of parcels travel far and wide, by any means, across our territories and entire continents.
Packaging of all types, sizes, and contents.

Try to imagine for a moment what that means: how much plastic is used in packaging?
And above all, how long is it actually used for? The time of a journey?

Well, because we assume that whoever receives a package, right after opening it, throws the plastic away.

No, in the long run, this cannot be considered a sustainable behavior.

Plastic? What a disaster.

Plastic is a macromolecular material created in a laboratory and composed of carbon and hydrogen, derived from oil and methane for more than 95%.
It’s clear that this cannot be the choice for those who look toward a future free from the use of fossil fuels (even though it has been the most used material in the world for decades).

Although in recent years the data regarding packaging recycling has been positive and encouraging, plastic continues to be one of the least virtuous materials and not at all suitable for eco-friendly shipping.

Luca Ruini, president of CONAI, states:

“Only plastic is lagging behind, but by less than two percentage points: in 2020, 48.7% of it was recycled in Italy, but reaching the 50% required by the Union within five years is not an issue.”

Sustainability

We know our planet has limited resources.
We’ve already told you how important we think it is to be eco-friendly, respecting the environment and finding alternative measures to those currently in use.

At Vico Food Box, we believe the concept of sustainability encompasses the meaning of our environmental choices: Sustainability is acting in such a way that resource consumption ensures the next generation receives the same amount of resources that we received from the previous one.

Eco-friendly shipping: a whole new story. Here’s ours.

We decided to write a different chapter in our story.
A green story, made of only recycled materials!

So here is our decision.

We got straight to the point and converted all of our shipping packaging:

• boxes and cartons

• dividers and protective and filling systems

• wine carriers

all made of paper and cardboard, 100% from recycled sources. ♻

No plastic material. Bubble wrap eliminated.

We’ll be honest: the change wasn’t easy or immediate—it required a long phase of testing and research.

We had to keep our international shipments safe and intact, protecting the precious Italian products we send to Vico-lovers around the world.

As you can imagine, many fragile items end up in our boxes...

Of course, not only the Italian cookies and snacks—delicious yet crumbly—were at risk. ?

We had to protect the integrity of delicacies in oil and of pure Italian red gold.
All the goodies in glass containers, in short:

Fortunately, for pasta, things were less complicated. We used an inner box made of corrugated cardboard:

All ready, then. Or almost. ✋
First, we need to write the small dedication that, by tradition, we include on the box for all Vico-lovers: ✍?

Well, needless to say, our lively and authentic box is also made from recycled cardboard.
All that’s left is to hand everything over to the courier. Italy at your doorstep is on its way!

This is the eco-friendly formula through which we try to contribute to protecting the planet.
What do you think?

If you have questions or doubts, remember you can contact us:
our Customers’ Happiness Team is ready to answer all your questions.