Morrisons has issued a storewide ban in the run up to Christmas, which will affect all shoppers ahead of the festive period. It comes after rival supermarket giants Tesco and Co-op also decided to enforce the same ban previously.
The ban sees plastic packaging axed from all of Morrisons' Christmas gift wrap and accessory ranges. The move means more than 3.1 tonnes of plastic shrink wrap will be ditched from the store's wrapping paper offerings alone, as reported by the MEN.
This is on top of Morrisons' removal of glitter and plastic from paper wrap, crackers and cards in previous years, which has also dramatically reduced its plastic usage by more than 150 tonnes in the last three years. This year, the supermarket has decided to scrap plastic film and plastic shrink wrap from its festive wrapping paper and gifting accessories too - including gift tags and bags.
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Instead, gift bags will consist of recyclable paper, with the store's plastic ribbon handles to be replaced by paper twist or paper braid alternatives. To make disposing of Christmas wrapping paper easier, Morrisons is also helping customers by introducing a fully recyclable sticky tape.
This means there is no need to remove it before placing it in curb-side collections or contaminating the paper recycling stream with bits of plastic. It comes after Tesco and Co-op have also previously decided to remove plastic packaging from its Christmas decoration and wrapping aisles.
Now, Morrisons is following suit, with other supermarkets being urged to do the same. Jodie Mackrill, Buying Manager for Christmas and Events at Morrisons, said: “ We are always looking to find ways to reduce and remove plastic packaging across all of the products we sell. It’s what our customers tell us they want too.
"During the Christmas period, 269,423 miles of wrapping paper are used every year*, contributing to plastic ending up in landfill. Our new entirely plastic-free Christmas wrap and gift range means customers can have a more sustainable Christmas and we hope that cutting costs on gift bags and wrapping paper will help them in that.”
The new range supports Morrisons target to reduce plastic packaging by 50 per cent and to make all own-brand plastic packaging recyclable, reusable or compostable by 2025.
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