News

Jan 13, 2024

Otter Garden Centres goes greener by ditching plastic bags

Otter Garden Centres is ditching plastic bags and switching to paper carriers

Otter Garden Centres is ditching plastic bags and switching to paper carriers which customers are being encourage to re-use.

The business has also donated the last two years’ income from selling plastic carriers to the Devon Environment Foundation, which funds grass-roots nature regeneration projects.

Managing Director, Jacqui Taylor said: "For many years we have used branded plastic bags in all our stores. But with the whole business now focussing on green issues we decided to phase these out in favour of brown paper bags.

"The new bags are made from strong, recycled brown paper and are printed with a water based ink, so they are 100 per cent recyclable. Even so, rather than put them into recycling collections, we would really like to see customers reusing them as much as possible.

"With their attractive design they make great gift bags, and they’re also ideal for those customers who use paper bags to make seed pots, which is really ingenious.

"We realise that paper bags have an environmental impact too, but the overriding benefit is the recyclability of paper, and the fact it can be composted. In a compost heap a paper bag should break down within four months, whilst a plastic bag can take up to 1,000 years!"

The business is asking customers to bring their own bags when possible rather than buy new, and to use cardboard boxes recycled from deliveries to the garden centres to carry plants to their cars. These can then be brought back to use again or be left for other customers. Plastic plant pot recycling is also available at all its branches.

The donation to the Devon Environment Foundation amounted to £2,430, collected from the sale of plastic bags during 2021 and 2022.

Amanda Keetley, Executive Director of Devon Environment Foundation said: "We’re very grateful to Otter Garden Centres; we directed their funds quickly to some innovative grassroots projects that required urgent support to kick-start or scale-up their positive impact for nature.

"Without donors like Otter Garden Centres, we wouldn't be able to support as many of the brilliant people delivering tangible nature-based solutions in Devon."

To find out more about the kind of projects Otter Garden Centres’ donation will be used for, visit Devon Environment Foundation