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Curious about this - and I mean it in a 100% sincere way - how much waste does Blue Apron generate, and why is it unreasonable? How does it stack up to other co

by dyim 9y ago

Curious about this - and I mean it in a 100% sincere way - how much waste does Blue Apron generate, and why is it unreasonable? How does it stack up to other common forms of waste generated by households?

ghaff 9y ago
Basically, there are a bunch of plastic bags, an ice pack, some mylar-type bubble wrap, and the cardboard box. Personally, I find the waste complaints overblown. I suspect you'd find a whole lot more waste with restaurant cooking for example and I actually reuse a fair bit of the BA packaging for other purposes. There are other services that have more of a focus on reusable containers but I have to wonder how much boils down to virtue signaling. I'm a bit skeptical that a reusable insulated package that UPS needs to make an extra trip to pickup is really that much less wasteful than what BA does.
- pessimizer 9y ago
  > you'd find a whole lot more waste with restaurant cooking for example Why would you say this? When I worked in restaurants, I remember very little waste (other than actual food waste and spoilage, of which there was tons.)
  - ghaff 9y ago
    >other than actual food waste and spoilage, of which there was tons Well yes. Not plastic bags but the overall level of wastage. (To say nothing of the energy/materials overhead associated with operating a restaurant.) I have nothing against restaurants. I'm just saying that Blue Apron packaging waste is pretty small potatoes compared to a lot of other ways of obtaining food.
- greglindahl 9y ago
  I wonder how likely it is you'll get a good discussion about the pros and cons of reusable packaging when you start off by calling people hypocrites?
imh 9y ago
They send individually packaged everything. Three meals amounts to about this much trash (those pieces of paper are full size 8.5x11" for scale. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CU1N8VJVEAATbNG.jpg:large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CU1N8VJVEAATbNG.jpg:large The giant foil insulator (shown) and gel ice-packs (not shown) were what did it for me. I found conflicting information on whether they were recyclable, but the best answers I could find indicated no. Apart from those pieces, the remainder of the waste (shown) was a lot, but not totally unreasonable.

by dyim 9y ago

ghaff 9y ago

Basically, there are a bunch of plastic bags, an ice pack, some mylar-type bubble wrap, and the cardboard box. Personally, I find the waste complaints overblown. I suspect you'd find a whole lot more waste with restaurant cooking for example and I actually reuse a fair bit of the BA packaging for other purposes. There are other services that have more of a focus on reusable containers but I have to wonder how much boils down to virtue signaling. I'm a bit skeptical that a reusable insulated package that UPS needs to make an extra trip to pickup is really that much less wasteful than what BA does.

pessimizer 9y ago
> you'd find a whole lot more waste with restaurant cooking for example Why would you say this? When I worked in restaurants, I remember very little waste (other than actual food waste and spoilage, of which there was tons.)
- ghaff 9y ago
  >other than actual food waste and spoilage, of which there was tons Well yes. Not plastic bags but the overall level of wastage. (To say nothing of the energy/materials overhead associated with operating a restaurant.) I have nothing against restaurants. I'm just saying that Blue Apron packaging waste is pretty small potatoes compared to a lot of other ways of obtaining food.
greglindahl 9y ago
I wonder how likely it is you'll get a good discussion about the pros and cons of reusable packaging when you start off by calling people hypocrites?

imh 9y ago

They send individually packaged everything. Three meals amounts to about this much trash (those pieces of paper are full size 8.5x11" for scale. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CU1N8VJVEAATbNG.jpg:large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CU1N8VJVEAATbNG.jpg:large The giant foil insulator (shown) and gel ice-packs (not shown) were what did it for me. I found conflicting information on whether they were recyclable, but the best answers I could find indicated no. Apart from those pieces, the remainder of the waste (shown) was a lot, but not totally unreasonable.