The leading children’s magazine publisher is stepping up its sustainability measures with the first paper-based covermount gift on Fun To Learn Favourites.

Redan says it has listened to consumers and their growing concern around the environment and is therefore trialling a number of paper-based toy covermounts across its portfolio in 2022.

Plastic toy covermounts are a key driver of sales, making this a risky change. To mitigate this, Redan tasked its creative team with designing products that are just as appealing and recognisable as the plastic ones and which give children instant play gratification. As a result, Redan is proud to offer Fun To Learn Favourites issue #414 as its first entirely plastic-free publication, demonstrating a huge step forward and marking a major milestone for the publisher.

Redan has committed to introduce at least 10 paper-based gifts across its magazine portfolio throughout 2022.

The editor of Fun To Learn Favourites, Gareth Brown, commented: “We’ve created a fun, plastic-free play set that offers immediate out-of-the-box play for children. Part of the fun is the simple assembly required to create the prehistoric scene, which children can keep changing as they role-play with Peppa, her friends and the dinosaurs.”

Gareth added: “Children are becoming more and more aware of humans’ impact upon the environment and this is our first step to reduce plastics in magazine covermounts. Hopefully plastic-free can become the norm for covermounts in future.”

The company has already implemented other revolutionary plastic free and 100% recyclable development in other areas. Commercial director Lisa Lowarch explained: “We have successfully created a great alternative to plastic bags using our new style of cardboard wrapper. This gives us a strong presence at point of sale but also offers more to the consumer: printing on the reverse of the wrapper adds extra content and more activities for children to enjoy.”

Although Redan will continue to utilise plastic covermount gifts, the company is limiting the presence of non-recyclable components. Redan has reduced the use of non-recyclable plastics by 70% over the last two years and is on target to reduce this to less than 10% non-recyclable materials by the end of 2022.

Lisa added: “The long-term aim is to eradicate non-recyclable materials completely and we continue to work with our suppliers to find alternative solutions which are both recyclable, safe and affordable.”