Feeling Good About Packing and Shipping

Company teaches children the difference between plastic and bio-degradable shipping materials.

This morning, my children participated in a scientific experiment and learned about the differences between plastic and bio-degradable shipping materials. It wasn’t at school. It was on my front porch, thanks to a small green insert in the shipping box containing our new butterfly grow kit.

It’s good for kids. It’s also smart marketing.

The package was from Insect Lore, which sells a variety of “watch them grow” insect kits. The small cylinders of butterfly larvae came shipped in what looks like regular peanuts, but the insert told us otherwise. It read,

We at Insect Lore care about the environment. That’s why we use shipping loosefill made of all-natural corn, wheat, and potato starches. Take a look at it — it’s different than styrofoam loosefill.

Try this fun experiment: Fill a cup with water and place one or two pieces of our loosefill into the cup. Watch it disappear! It’s water soluable.

It’s even one step better than biodegradable; it’s organic. You can put it to work in a composting bin. Or, better yet, reuse it next time you’re shipping something.

This material costs us a little more money, but we think it’s worth every penny if it helps the environment.

There are lots of things I like about this company’s approach. First, while they paid more for the loosefill, they made up for it on the product margin and the shipping. What they gained, however, was a real opportunity to engage their customers.

By encouraging people to get their children to experiment with this material, it creates a hands-on experience that creates a positive association for both parents and children that won’t easily be forgotten. It also reinforced the educational nature of the company’s products and mission — something important to its core customer base.

The company was very smart in the way it promoted this environmental investment and turned what some might see as an unnecessary cost into a great marketing and customer retention tool.

Organic, bio-degradable loosefill may not be the reason I purchase from Insect Lore again. But it certainly helps me to feel good about it.

I’m not sure which loosefill Insect Lore used, but I did a quick search for loosefill with organic wheat, potato, and corn starch and Flo-Pak’s product popped up everywhere.