Customer Reviews

Paper or Plastic: Searching for Solutions to an Overpackaged World.

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I really liked this book for telling me about things that I haden't thought of before, although I thought myself to be an evironmentally aware person. Some of the statistics are breathtaking. Facts are supported by visuals and an attractive layout. As a general reader with no specific education in the environmental science field, it was a bit dry for me at times, but well worth the read. I made lasting changes in my every day life due to the book, and can't get the statistics about plastic bottles and only small amounts of the actually recyclables making it to a "next life" beyond the garbage dump out of my head. Quite life changing.

If every person in America understood the energy, chemicals, natural resources and money that went into creating packages, it's likely our consumption habits would dramatically change. Imhoff does a great job of detailing the hazards and challenges of packaging, without being preachy - he lets the statistics and facts tell the story. This book informs, amazes, and startles the reader.

This book is excellent and a very easy read. It does a great job of breaking down the different products and their impact on the environment. There are great examples of companies that are doing their part to help reduce the negative impact on the environment.

Paper Or Plastic is filled with excellent, detailed and inspiring examples of innovative ways to reduce environmental impacts of packaging. But the principles discussed in the examples extend beyond packaging, and as someone involved in product design, I found many ideas that I could apply to non-packaging efforts also. If you are in the realm of product development, this is a top-notch book to read.

It has its share of doom and gloom statistics, but for the most part the book is action and solution oriented, giving solid advice and approaches backed up by success stories. Many of these examples are from large, mainstream companies, and not the same old chestnuts that we hear about all the time at sustainability conferences or in magazines about niche companies -- valid ideas, but often not scalable to large companies.

The authors have clearly done their homework digging around in the bowels of large company supply chains. Some of what they talk about is not attention-grabbing headline-making stuff, but it is the necessary nuts and bolts of making steady improvements toward less environmental impact.

Daniel Imhoff's book chronicling the search for "solutions to an overpackaged world" is laid out like a text book from a Sustainability 101 course, but mostly manages to avoid the dryness that would imply, though the acronym or jargon-wary may find themselves a bit dizzy. Imhoff offers a thorough, well-thought-out glimpse into the perils and potentials of packaging, the "skin of commerce." He starts with a look at how packaging arrived at this state, describing it as product of a marketing arms race, then describes how factors such as the demands of "big box" stores (oversized PVC blister packs to prevent the theft of small items, for instance) and international commerce have added to the dilemma. Imhoff also takes a hard look at the myths and realities of recycling and eco-labels, which is worth the price of this book alone. The book is interspersed with examples of manufacturers rising to the challenge of better packaging as well as some experiments in waste reduction undertaken by other countries. Overall, this book offers a clearer understanding of the complexities of packaging in the modern world, and is recommended.

We all know the feeling. We are in the supermarket with our jumble of purchases and the cashier casually asks, "Paper or plastic?" What a choice. Destroy more trees or use more oil? Bravo to author Daniel Imhoff for tackling the question that has many a concerned citizen frozen in stores throughout North America with sweaty palms and racing hearts.
The answer to the paper or plastic dilemma, for those of you that just can't wait to read the book is: neither. Imhoff explains what we need to do is, "Eliminate, reduce, refill, and recycle as much as possible." And while you are reducing use a reusable cloth tote bag. All the time, no exceptions.
Paper or Plastic: Searching for Solutions to an Overpackaged World is the definitive guide to understanding packaging and learning how to reduce our patterns of consumption. Imhoff gives a succinct background on the packaging dilemma and how much energy and resources it takes to produce each type of disposable packaging we commonly use. For example: to produce 1 ton of paper consumes over 98 tons of resources -think of that the next time you reach for a single use paper bag or single use coffee cup. Paper or Plastic reports 270 million tons of oil and gas are used each year to manufacture plastic packaging in the USA alone.
Paper or Plastic is a well-researched book, filled with interesting facts in a well-designed package from the award-winning team at Watershed Media. Without question, Paper or Plastic is the best book on the market about packaging and unnecessary consumption.
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Publisher: Watershed Media Book
168 Pages
GreenMuze.com Rating: ****

Since innovative thinking on ways to balance packaging and the environment is always in short supply, I was curious to see if Paper or Plastic: Searching for Solutions to an Overpackaged World by Daniel Imhoff would contribute something new. Though the book did indeed start out as a polemic against packaging, it quickly changed into a more productive--and provocative--course.

Imhoff, Executive Director of Watershed Media, reports on what is realistically possible in terms of the latest technology, from a new generation of zero-effluent mini-mills to the latest thinking in natural capitalism, eco-intelligence, design, and biomimicry, all as applied to packaging. (The biomimicry section alone will spur many ideas for the creative package designer.) Imhoff also covers the newest generation of bioplastics from a variety of suppliers, reviewing pros and cons of each material. Case studies show green packaging done right.

Also included: a comprehensive checklist for assessing the environmental impact of packaging before the designer makes a selection decision. The list includes attributes designers should keep in mind when selecting materials.
This is a well-written, fairly reported, attractively put-together book that deserves a place on the bookshelf of any designer or materials specifier. The 168-page trade paperback is available for $16.95.

Capsule review by Dave Newcorn, Vice President New Media, Summit Electronic Media.

There are environmental causes that stir the emotions--the plight of whales and baby seals, the fate of redwoods, or the metastasis of suburbia. But Daniel Imhoff would point out that the most pervasive and fastest-growing environmental problem is so commonplace it's invisible: packaging. Styrofoam containers from a fast-food meal, the anti-theft blister packaging that encapsulates retail electronics, or the common aluminum can and plastic bottle are all part of a waste stream that composes some 300 pounds of garbage per person per year, headed straight from the shelf to the landfill.
Apparently mindful of the fact you can read only so much about polystyrene peanuts and polyethylene bottles, Imhoff has organized his book into punchy little essays, short case studies, and colorful charts that survey the extent of the packaging problem, along with a range of solutions that some companies are trying.

Imhoff points out that packaging is increasingly the product itself--a method corporations use to market feelings of familiarity, uniformity, or purity. To illustrate, he would have you consider evolution of the egg: It is nature's perfect packaged food source, with its container, the shell, being durable yet entirely biodegradable. For years, eggs came in molded paper pulp. Now the most expensive of them frequently come in molded plastic trays, derived from petroleum products. (Nature's Promise, which markets eco-friendly eggs, requests on its tray that you recycle the plastic packaging, even though few municipalities take such containers.) And lately eggs come as pre-scrambled "pasteurized real egg product," in capped cartons at premium prices--far removed from the simple egg. The packaging will be with us decades, maybe eons, after the egg has been cracked, scrambled, and eaten.

As its title implies, packaging choices for environmentalists are dilemmas, with few simple solutions: Would you rather bag your groceries in the products of clear-cut forests or petroleum? He holds up companies such as Aveda, the Minneapolis-based cosmetics company, as pioneers. Aveda worked to eliminate toxic or less-recyclable plastics from its packaging line, and strove for 100 percent recycled plastics in its containers, risking profit margins in the process. Other companies are experimenting with novel products, such as biodegradable plastics.

But even these are merely "less bad" solutions in a world full of packaging waste. Imhoff concedes that packaging offers a good deal of convenience and that making upright choices involves giving up some of that convenience. He recommends carrying a mug and a reusable water bottle, eating in instead of getting takeout, buying in bulk (which reduces packaging waste), buying from local farmers and farmers' markets, and toting around cloth bags. When the cashier asks the question in the book's title, Imhoff suggests, hand over a cloth bag and say, "Neither."