UNCONTAINED: Plastic loses class: It's the glass, glass, glass!

During my first year out of college, my apartment-mates and I counted every penny we could save. Furnishing the kitchen was pricey enough as it is, and as far as glassware went, my roommate invested his spare change in POM Tea for refreshment-not just for the beverage, but also for the cool glass it was packaged in, which we would clean out and store in the cupboard for future use.

That’s why I don’t find it surprising that consumers are causing an uproar in response to POM’s transition from a glass container to a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottle. This is an excellent example of packaging dictating product sales, as well as one type of sustainability (reuse) being overlooked for another (recycle). While the switch from glass to PET may appear to be more sustainable, I think one consumer put it best:

“Plastic bottles can be recycled, yes, but those cool glasses, that apparently were much loved, are much more earth friendly in the long run if everyone saves and reuses them.”

Click on the following link and read the comments posted to see what I mean: http://pomwonderfulblog.typepad.com/pom_wonderful/2008/05/announcing-pom.html.