In honor of Earth Day, The Estée Lauder Companies (ELC) has issued a report on its latest eco-friendly packaging initiatives and advances in sustainability made by each of its brands.
One highlight: 71% of all ELC's packaging is now recyclable, refillable, reusable, recycled, or recoverable. ELC's latest report covers the fiscal year 2023.
Nancy Mahon, Chief Sustainability Officer, ELC, comments, “We have an opportunity to take our packaging innovation to an even greater level by continuing to implement sustainability principles that allow us to create elegant solutions for our consumers while keeping the environment in mind.”
ELC debuted its Packaging Sustainability Guidelines in 2020, providing a clear road map for strategies that reduce plastic packaging material use, design for reuse, and increase recycling content. "These guidelines, coupled with custom-developed tools and industry methodologies such as third-party-reviewed life-cycle assessments, help integrate sustainability principles at the core of our packaging decisions," Mahon says.
Reducing Waste and Plastic Across Operations
The global beauty powerhouse has issued plastic guidelines to help minimize virgin petroleum plastic and reduce non-recyclable plastic across the company’s packaging, products, and retail spaces. The company says it also prioritizes recycling and waste reduction within its infrastructure, manufacturing, distribution and innovation sites.
Prestigious Packaging Redefined
ELC says it aims to elevate consumer experience by implementing materials and packaging solutions with sustainability, luxury, functionality, compatibility, and quality in mind.
The Aveda brand approaches responsible packaging with the development of paper-based, locally recyclable sachets for product samples. Compared to their plastic predecessors, the production of this sachet is said to reduce water consumption by at least 36% and emit 37% fewer greenhouse gases.
ELC also works with its brands to tailor solutions to fit each brand’s consumer demographics and unique requirements.
The Estée Lauder brand used glass packaging to advance its luxury and sustainability design approach to help drive the relaunch of its Revitalizing Supreme + Moisturizer Youth Power Creme, which now offers a refillable pod to help minimize packaging weight by 90%, compared to the previous non-recyclable packaging design.
Industry-Wide Impact
ELC participates in industry-wide initiatives and is a member of global associations such as the Sustainable Packaging Initiative for Cosmetics.
Rob Peterson, Senior Vice President, Global R&D and Supply Chain comments:
“On our journey to drive sustainability in luxury packaging, it is crucial to understand the challenges we face in the industry and to create partnerships and collaborations with sustainability organizations, recyclers, and suppliers that expand our knowledge about our packaging materials and formats. At ELC, we believe packaging enables new, agile and unique value propositions that can help advance sustainability solutions for our brands and for the personal care and cosmetics industries at large.”
