At Redifarms, we strive to keep ourselves and our planet healthy. That is why our team has put in a painstaking effort to find packaging that makes not only our products happy but our customers happy as well.
Our farm team chose boxes made of recycled cardstock, made in the U.S.A., for our mushroom packaging. These beautifully die-cut boxes are ideal for storing mushrooms due to the cardstock material’s breathable nature. We have had remarkable success with these recyclable boxes and will be moving forward with using these for shipping and/or local pick-up in the future. When it comes time to properly dispose of these boxes, recycling is best.
Meanwhile, for our clear packages, containing our herbs, microgreens, and lettuces, we went in the direction of using a commercially compostable material. The best way to dispose of these pieces is to remove our stickers, and then pour hot water over the containers. This act will cause the packages to collapse upon themselves; rendering them perfect for the local compost facility. The closest to Westfield is headquartered in South Orange, to learn more about the facility and what they offer click here to see their website: https://www.javascompost.com/ . They are currently the compost site for several North Jersey towns, offering services such as residential and commercial pick up, the closest compost drop off site to our location being Summit at Sustainable Haus Mercantile, 221 Broad St., Summit, NJ 07901, or for the full list click the link here: https://www.javascompost.com/drop-off. According to our container manufacturer, these products will break down within 100 days (about 3 and a half months) at a commercial compost facility.
If you have purchased some of our produce and were not sure of how to properly dispose of the packaging – no shame, we all make mistakes from time to time – fear not! We have done our research and learned that there are no chemicals or oils that will be released into our environment due to the material they are manufactured from.
I thank you very much for explaining the packaging. I hope that our email conversation was one of the things that prompted you to do that. I feel much better now!
A new side note. I understand about the commercial composting facilities, and I have visited Sustainable Haus in Summit. Question – We have an above ground twin metal composter that we turn on a semi-regular basis and in which we have worms to assist in the breakdown of material. Do you know if the compostable packaging will break down in that? Or other home composters? That would certainly make it even easier for consumers and reduce air pollution from driving to a commercial composting facility. I thank you for your time.