As someone with a mild online shopping addiction, I have amassed quite a collection of randomly sized envelopes from around the world, the ones with bubble wrap inside, the really strong cardboard ones, the tiny ones that seem useless and the massive ones that are nearly a box! Most of these strong envelopes can be used over and over again, it’s so wasteful to bin them after one go!
Whenever a new exciting envelope arrives, its contents are removed gleefully, the stamps taken off for charity, any address labels removed and then it’s filed away ready to be used again at a later date.
When the opportunity arises to reuse the envelope, you just cover over the front & write the new address details on it. You can simply sellotape a sheet of paper over the old address, buy rolls/sheets of blank labels or there are loads of online sites where you can buy envelope re-use labels with a message already printed on them, whatever floats your boat!
You can get some from Friends of the Earth to highlight the environment, Viva to spread the vegan message, many local charities and environmental groups sell them, such as the Irish Peatland Conservation Council, or if you feel creative you could print your own to draw attention to your own particular causes.
The really tatty envelopes can get one final blast of life by becoming a very useful shopping list or joining together to make a scribble pad for beside the phone or computer before finally ending up in the recycle bin.
I must admit, I actually prefer when I get a package that has been wrapped in reused packaging, it somehow looks that little bit more exciting and well-travelled.
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This is a great tip and I enjoyed reading your blog!
I recently started re-labeling the sturdy envelopes and using them. Great post! The stickers from Viva are lovely.
I hoard packing materials from stuff I get in the mail for this reason! Padded envelopes can be reused soooo many times. & aside from the cheaper/greener-ness of it, it also means I pretty much never have to run out to buy supplies before I pack up stuff to take to the post office.
Also, for folks who sell stuff on eBay, Half.com or other online sites, the money you save on having to buy packaging obviously means you make more on everything you sell. I’m currently trying to sell off a lot of my books online since I am possibly moving abroad this year, & anything that adds to my bottom line, while being greener to boot, is great.
[...] heads or of our shadows or our feet! I’ve shared my simple little crafty household projects, green tips and reviewed many yummy vegan recipes. I’ve taken part in the Go-Green challenge and tried to [...]
That’s a really great suggestion – one that often crosses my mind as we ship so much stuff. I think we will add a note to our emailed receipts for people to consider re-using the packaging. Most boxes for example, can easily be re-used 3-4 times, I would thing. Kraft paper and bubble wrap could go much longer.
On the warehouse side, we re-use everything possible, with the exception of large cardboard boxes. They can often be fairly beat-up, and too big for most customer shipments. Those get recycled.
It s not just the cost savings (those are basically negated by the extra effort) from re-using packing material, its more that filling up a trash dumpster does not sit well at all with us. Now, we have dedicated bins to hold re-usable packing supplies.
[...] may recall that I scavenge anything reuseable from our post, well ’tis the same with any presents that we gleefully receive. Since [...]