As more and more brands look for sustainably-sourced printing options, Avery Dennison has continued to develop products to meet these demands. From CleanFlake to ClearIntent, the company has created multiple portfolios to drive environmental friendliness in its substrates and adhesives.

Avery Dennison has three sustainability standards that help ensure sustainable products: Responsible sourcing, reduction of materials, and recycle. For responsible sourcing, a specific amount of the content is verified to come from sustainably sourced materials. Meanwhile, a reduction of materials offers comparable or superior performance by using less materials. Finally, recycling requires a specific amount of the content to be recyclable, made of recycled content or enables recycling.

“Avery Dennison is focused on increasing the number of products included in our ClearIntent Portfolio,” explains Heather Valentino, sustainability manager at Avery Dennison. “For a product to qualify for the Avery Dennison ClearIntent Portfolio, at least one of our product components must meet at least one of these three sustainability standards. Avery Dennison applies concrete, measurable criteria to ensure that products meet these standards. This makes it easier for our customers to be assured that they are selecting the best Avery Dennison products to help the environment.”

According to Avery Dennison, up to 100% of a PET container can be made using recycled PET (rPET), with no limit to the number of times PETmaterial can be reused in container applications. CleanFlake has been designed to improve the rPET yield in the recycling process without sacrificing the shelf appeal of pressure sensitive labels. ClearIntent allows customers to choose the most appropriate and sustainable material for a given application.

In addition, Avery Dennison diligently works with its customers to identify recycling outlets for materials throughout North America. Thus far, the company has seen tremendous feedback from its customers.

“They are excited to be part of the solution to reduce environmental impacts,” says Valentino. “With every new customer, they are energized to expand where CleanFlake is used to help in the aid of recycling.

“When we meet with customers, we discuss our sustainability initiatives and talk about how we can help them achieve their sustainability goals,” she adds. “In order for us to be successful, we have to work with everyone in the value chain, suppliers and customers. In a manufacturing organization, reducing waste is one common topic for all of us. Helping a customer of ours reduce their waste by showcasing our best practices helps the customer reduce their environmental impact and helps us achieve our sustainability goal of reducing label waste in landfills.”

With the growth of technology, there are now more means to produce sustainable products. All members of the value chain are starting to take notice, too, as this has become a hot topic in the industry.

“Environmental concerns are more prevalent now than three years ago,” says Valentino. “Before compliance was the status quo. Now, more companies are trying to reduce their environmental impacts through the creation of sustainability goals.”

In order for sustainability to grow even further, infrastructure in North America must continue to improve. Valentino recommends a marketplace of items that are made from recycled material. In most cases, these items are considered niche, which leads to more expensive prices.

Many companies have become proactive on this topic, setting goals of where they want their companies to be, with regards to the environment, in 5-10 years. “Large brands in the consumer product arena are setting new and ambitious sustainability goals. They are paving the way by challenging other organizations to be more sustainable. I believe that this will have a trickle-down effect and the public will expect all organizations to be operating more sustainably,” concludes Valentino.