Kickstart: Loblaw turns to supply base to extend sustainability goals

Loblaw Cos. Ltd., one of Canada's largest grocery store chains and its largest food distributor, will require all plastic packaging for its store brand to be fully recyclable or reusable by 2025.

The March 22 announcement by the Brampton, Ontario-based company expands on its previous target to improve its carbon footprint and expand its focus to suppliers.

In 2016, Loblaw said it would cut its corporate carbon emissions 30 percent by 2030. It actually reached that target in 2020. It now will "extend this momentum into its franchised networks and distribution centers and ultimately to its supplier network," the company said.

It now has a target to be net zero for greenhouse gas emissions within its own footprint by 2040 and hit net zero for its entire network, including suppliers, by 2050.

It also has set a 2030 date to elminate all food waste sent to landfills and have a zero emission truck fleet.

Igloo Coolers is bumping up use of post-consumer recycled plastics in its products with a goal of using 30 million recycled containers by 2025.

Its March 25 announcement comes a year after the Katy, Texas, consumer company introduced its Ecocool collection, which it said was the world's first hardsided coolers made with PCR from discarded yogurt cups and milk jugs.

Next month, the Ecocool line extends to its 70-quart premium Trailmate cooler line. The Ecocool Trailmate will be built with 98 percent PCR in the outside body and lid and 48 percent PCF in the liner. Igloo also uses post-consumer PET for its Repreve soft-sided cooler collection.

Housewares molder Home Products International Inc. is going all in on plastics for its products while closing its metal operation in Seymour, Ind., although it may have a buyer lined up for that site.

What's interesting about the metal business, though, is that it claims to be the last maker of steel ironing boards in the U.S. I'm not sure if that's a sign of American companies offshoring business or simply a sign that Americans don't iron very much anymore.

In a statement to local media, HMI CEO George Hamilton blamed "market conditions over the past two years driven largely by the COVID-19 pandemic and rising steel costs for the decision to end the ironing board business." The United Kingdom-based retailer John Lewis reported that ironing board sales dropped 26 percent in March 2020.

But one potentially unexpected market for ironing boards during the early days of the pandemic? Converting them into a quick and cheap option for a home office.

"The humble ironing board can serve as a sit/stand desk," The New York Times' Wirecutter column wrote in May 2020. "Its tiny footprint makes it perfect for small spaces, you can easily adjust the height for sitting or standing, and you can fold it away when you're done working."