Frito-Lay and SunChips Back Away From Environmentally Sound Packaging

Thirty-two Weeks. That's about how long the compostable SunChips bag managed to last before Frito-Lay decided it would rather back away from tiny steps to protect the environment than listen to a few people complain that the bag is "too loud." Yes, because the compostable bag is loud (it is), people complained and Frito-Lay said, "Screw the environment. Late night secret snackers must be protected from this insidiously loud menace!"

Frito-Lay will continue to offer the Original Flavor SunChips in the new bag, but it is discontinuing the use of the bag in all other flavors. Apparently those whiny secret snackers only eat the more exciting flavors like Harvest Cheddar and Garden Vegetable.

I'm not pretending the new bag was going to save the environment. It wasn't. How many of those bags were actually getting composted anyway? (I can only vouch for three.) But it was a step in the right direction for a company that generally does more harm than good in the world of nutritionally sound snacking (I'm not picking on Frito-Lay, almost all such companies are equally guilty--but Frito-Lay is easily one of the largest and has a huge environmental footprint). Unless companies can take a stand and stick with such products we're not going to make much progress in the world of responsible packaging.

Certainly Frito-Lay realized the bags were loud. They most certainly spent tens of thousands of dollars on the marketing aspect alone, which had to have included consumer reactions prior to a full release. "It's really loud" could not have been a surprise reaction. If it was, then they didn't do their homework.

The company plans to do further research to find a quieter alternative. I suspect doing so will involve chemical additives that might not belong in a food container. But that's never stopped food and beverage companies in the past and it certainly won't again unless we force Government regulations upon them. In our current political climate that is unlikely.

In an ideal world we will see a quiet bag that is more readily compostable. Company estimates of 12-16 weeks for composting require ideal composting conditions. Most back yard composters don't quite live up to those standards of green and brown balance, temperature control, etc. We compost the materials we have and make the best of it. Where did I get my thirty-two week figure from at the beginning of this post? That's how long my bag has been in my composter and I bought a bag as soon as they hit my local store. Are my bags fully composted? No. They are still easily identifiable as SunChips bags and still have a degree of integrity to them. Like I said, ideal conditions.

I hope Frito-Lay reconsiders this decision and continues to move in the direction of environmentally sound packaging. It's unfortunate that this initial step ended in what I am sure will be dubbed a marketing failure. Maybe they should come up with some adds that feature the loud bag--perhaps with some new "loud" flavors. I'm not going to hold my breath, though. Frito-Lay and almost any food and beverage company of such magnitude have one thing in mind--profits. The environment and your health are probably not even second on the list of priorities. Heaven forbid a few crazies say they're going to boycott SunChips because the bag is too loud. That might mean a decrease in profits by .001 percent!

How about this one? I hereby refuse to buy SunChips because the "original" bag they are returning to ISN'T LOUD ENOUGH!

My First Batch of "Tumbled" Compost

It has been eleven weeks since I completed my home made compost tumbler. The other day I decided that since I was wearing a pair of rubber gloves I would reach into the tumbler and test the consistency of the compost. I had noticed that (almost overnight) the tumbler was spinning easily and felt much lighter than it had when I started. I have always read that compost should be the consistency of a wet sponge that has been lightly wrung, but I'd never actually groped my gross gruel to check--I just figured as long as it was steaming away, it was probably "cooking" pretty well.

What I found was that I had a tumbler full of nicely finished humus-like compost! Rich, black, and chock full of nutrients, I put a handful on my screen and rubbed it through. It was finally done!

I hadn't planned on it, but I ended up emptying the contents of the tumbler, screening the compost, and filling a storage tub with the black gold-standard of garden goodness. As with any home made compost, there were a few things in there that wouldn't screen through. I found a few small rocks (?!?!), which I tossed to the side. There were some mango pits, which I put back into the bin, figuring they would eventually break down in subsequent rounds. The same for some avocado pits and not-quite-broken-down squash stems and things like that. There were some avocado skins that still looked like avocado skins, but they crumbled pretty easily and most went through my screen accordingly. Anything that didn't screen that I determined to be "eventually compostable" went back into the bin for the next cycle.

I found some interesting things besides the rocks though! The picture above isn't everything, but it's a representative sample. What are those things? I asked myself the same question while I was sifting the compost, but I finally figured it out. Those plastic sleeves? Well, I am 99.99% positive they are the linings of oatmeal and tea bag packets! Those instant oatmeal packets and the paper wrappers around tea bags are apparently lined with some pretty durable stuff. Hopefully it doesn't leach into our food too much! I also found several small strips of clear plastic (you can see one in the picture). I knew almost immediately what those were--the remains of a shredded debit card! I knew a few pieces of it went into the bin at some point when I was adding shredded paper. The interesting thing is that all I found were the little strips of clear plastic, which means the rest of the card--the colored plastic, etc., is apparently made of some kind of biodegradable plastic. Cool! What's that other chunk, though? It is one of two synthetic corks that I found in the mix, somewhat broken down, but generally recognizable.

In the end the compost is nice. It should drain pretty well because there some pistachio shells mixed throughout that didn't break down much at all. I suspect there are still some more or less viable squash seeds in there that might sprout, but those are easy to spot and eliminate should it come to that.

I am quite pleased with the results and am looking forward to having a second tumbler in the future. My friend Ryan, who supplied the first barrel, is keeping an eye out for a second barrel for me.That way my compost will work on a nice schedule of filling and tumbling one barrel till it's "full," then letting it just tumble and cure and finish while the second barrel moves into filling and tumbling mode (after yielding excellent compost, of course).

I am still amazed that the kitchen sCRAPs and miscellaneous things like toilet paper tubes and shredded paper bags from sandwich shops and weeds from the yard can turn into something like this. I know there are some cities out there that have implemented curbside composting (some of them mandatory!) and can only imagine how great it would be if every community did this. So much usable waste goes into the landfill where, at best, it will, hopefully, yield some usable methane that could more immediately be used to propagate growth and nourish food crops and maybe, just maybe, eliminate some of the unnecessary and harmful use of artificial nitrogen-based fertilizers.