Fudge Sunday - Thinking Outside the Cardboard Box

by Jay Cuthrell
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Start the week more informedNow that China has said “no thank you” to scrap recycling imports, there is a good chance the familiar cardboard recycling bin will take on greater significance as the piles… continue to make a bigger pile. This week, let’s take a look at the humble cardboard box.

Humble Origins

Over the past 200 years there have been cardboard boxes big and small. The advent of global shipping and ever quickening supply chain technologies have only served to increase awareness of the cardboard box.

1817 - Cardboard is born

200 years of boxes.

en.wikipedia.org

From inception to meme took roughly 200 years for the cardboard box. Now, the cardboard box is a keystroke away to help us all express ourselves faster than ever before.

2015 - The 📦 Package Emoji

You know you’ve made it when you are enshrined in a Unicode update.

emojipedia.org

Then again, by 2015, Amazon had become notorious due to a combination of expanding fulfillment options, smart phones, social media, and the seemingly unquenchable thirst for newly minted viral ready memes on the Interwebs.

2015 - Amazon Packaging Memes

Warning: NSFW title on this link but then again… it kinda had a point.

www.buzzfeed.com

Bring in the Robots

Amazon is no stranger to robotics. The early adoption of Kiva robots indicates that fulfillment efficiency is a journey for Amazon, not simply a destination.

2017 - CartonWrap 1000

Come for the concept. Stay for the soundtrack.

www.youtube.com

2018 - CartonWrap 1000 refinements

The soundtrack to your single click e-commerce future is slightly lower volume.

www.youtube.com

2019 - Commensurate Cardboard

Amazon is extending more robotics to refine another aspect of the toothbrush in gigantic cardboard box conundrum.

www.reuters.com

Recycling Innovations

Looking ahead, there will be more opportunities to reclaim cardboard boxes in ways that favor the paper industry as a whole. Growing more trees is a good idea by almost any accounting of renewable resources.

2010 - The Sustainable Supply Chain

10 years later… where are we?

hbr.org

Creative ideas will emerge. Ideas that smell like success will likely succeed.

2018 - KFC Scent Infused Enviro-Log

Fingerlickin’ good ideas are just around the corner.

boingboing.net

If anything, perhaps the days of the plastic water bottle will become a footnote as boxed water and bio compost ready packaging takes hold in consumer purchasing patterns.

So until next time, don’t print this newslestter…

But feel free to forward it via email to a peer.

😃

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