UK retailer Tesco is reducing the size of its large multipack toilet paper SKUs by implementing a new way of winding the paper onto cardboard tubes.
The move will help the retailer reduce 67 tonnes of plastic packaging each year as it will either fit more paper onto each roll, or wind rolls more tightly, so that they take up less space.
The reduction in size means 17 fewer lorries will be used each week to transport the rolls from the supplier to Tesco’s distribution centres.
Those lorries will be redeployed to deliver other products to stores as they get busier in the run-up to Christmas, Tesco added.
'Removing Unnecessary Plastic'
Katie Frost, buying manager for paper at Tesco, said, “As well as removing unnecessary plastic, reducing the size of multipacks will free up valuable space in our lorries that can be put to great use this Christmas.
“We are looking at a number of ways to use less packaging as a part of our 4Rs packaging strategy. In the last few years, we have cut six thousand tonnes of packaging from products, including a billion pieces of plastic.”
The retailer has reduced the size of its 24-roll own-brand pack of toilet rolls – one of its bulkiest products – by replacing it with the new 12 pack of ‘double rolls’ that have twice the number of sheets wound on to them.
By upgrading this product alone, Tesco hopes to save 46 tonnes of plastic and allocate five lorries each week for other loads.
The retailer will continue to implement the packaging changes to other own-brand toilet paper SKUs in the coming months.
The four- and nine-roll packs will see tissue paper wound more tightly to reduce packaging, which will enable it to save 14 tonnes of plastic a year and redeploy eight lorries.
© 2021 European Supermarket Magazine. Article by Dayeeta Das. For more Packaging news, click here. Click to sign up to ESM: European Supermarket Magazine.
