Did you know?

Over 50 billion paper cups end up in U.S. landfills each year due to the difficulties recyclers have dealing with plastic-coated cup stock.

While paper cups may seem like they should be ‘recyclable’, they are not. Paper cups are made with a plastic coating called Polyethylene that’s used to form them into shape and stop liquids from leaking out. Unfortunately, the plastic-coated cups are too difficult for paper recyclers to process through their equipment, so they get diverted to landfills.

Sustainable C-Store Packaging Solutions

Unlike conventional plastic-coated paper cups which end up in the landfill, we’ve developed paper cups designed to be easily recycled, called reCUP.

reCUP® looks, feels and performs the same as conventional plastic-coated paper cups. The only difference is, reCUP® is made with an innovative coating called EarthCoating®.

EarthCoating® is a mineral-enriched resin alternative that uses 51% less plastic than conventional plastic coatings and is being used around the world to produce paper cups designed to be easily recycled using conventional paper recycling equipment.

In addition to paper drinking cups, EarthCoating® is being used to produce a variety of paper-based foodservice barrier packaging including food trays, folding cartons, labels, liners, corrugated packaging, ice cream tubs, popcorn buckets and more.

Closing the loop

Once paper cups and foodservice packaging made with EarthCoating® are being used, brands are encouraged to set up a closed-loop recycling program with one of our collection vendors or your local recycler.

The first step to getting paper cups recycled is to make them valuable and easy for recyclers to process through their conventional paper recycling equipment. This is where reCUP® comes in.

Here is how it works:

Benefits of using paper products made with EarthCoating®

Plastic reduction
The immediate benefit of using paper products made with EarthCoating® is a 51% reduction of plastic. For example, the amount of plastic coating to produce conventional poly-coated paper cups is approximately 6% plastic (by weight). By using EarthCoating® as an alternative to Polyethylene, brands can immediately reduce the amount of plastic by over half.

Less waste hauler fees
In addition to plastic reduction, paper products made with EarthCoating® are designed to be easily recycled using conventional paper recycling equipment. This often results in increased recycling rates which leads to less waste hauling services being needed. What if you could cut down on the number of times your waste hauler visits your locations?

Landfill waste diversion metric reporting
Our closed-loop collection partners and local recyclers have a financial incentive to collect and recycle paper products made with EarthCoating® along with any other recyclables you may have available for collection. Once collected, brands may receive a certificate of recycling based on the weight associated with each type of recyclable material collected and provided access to real time waste diversion data via an online dashboard.

Earn recycling rebates
The value associated with paper products made with EarthCoating® provides brands with an opportunity to share in the revenue earned on the sale of the commodity recyclables to the local material recovery facility. Once collection fees are offset, brands may earn rebates from our closed-loop collection partners.

As global consumer and municipal demand for plastic reduction and increased recycling rates continue to rise, we aim to make transitioning to sustainable packaging as easy as possible for you. To learn more, we invite you to contact us today.

Thank you for your consideration.