The company will remove nearly 800 tons of single use plastic from its Bunch O Balloons range.
As part of Earth Day yesterday, Zuru reinforced its commitment to environmental social responsibility by announcing a 360-degree sustainability programme for its Bunch O Balloons brand.
Zuru’s immersive Bunch O Balloons programme will prevent an estimated 800 tons of single-use plastic from entering the supply chain each year and enable consumers to recycle all elements of the product, no matter the local regulations. Beginning this August, the company will start to produce all Bunch O Balloons plastic stems and caps from 100% fully certified and traceable post-consumer-recycled plastic; material that has been in the marketplace, recycled and then sourced by Zuru to use in its manufacturing.
“The Bunch O Balloons programme showcases our all-in commitment to a full-circle approach to sustainability,” said Anna Mowbray, Zuru’s chief operating officer. “We are changing to 100% recycled plastic in our manufacturing, essentially giving it a new life, rather than seeing it end up in landfills and the ocean, as well as providing consumers easy opportunities to recycle after use.”
Zuru’s partnership with renowned recycling company TerraCycle will continue, enabling consumers to ship at no cost Bunch O Balloons parts, balloon pieces and foil bag packaging. The programme is currently offered in the UK, US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
Zuru is also taking further steps across its brands to eliminate waste. By the end of the year, the company is committed to transitioning an estimated 13m plastic polybags to sustainably sourced paper surprise bags. The move, where applicable to maintain product quality, will take place across the Rainbocorns, 5 Surprise, Smashers and the new Itty Bitty Prettys brands.
Additionally, Zuru is taking steps to evolve product packaging. The Sparkle Girlz brand will move towards integrating more plastic blister-free packaging across the range. Tiny Town ride-ons are distinctively designed to stack during shipping and at retail. The stackable, no-packaging required product lowers the carbon footprint by over 75%.
Zuru is also working to better label and therefore help consumers identify plastics that can be recycled. By June 2021 they will be looking to adapt all its moulds to have all plastic pieces in its toys labelled with the correct plastic grade and recycling logo, where relevant, to help increase the rate of recycling.
