Sir Kensington’s Sets Goal for 100% Recycled Content in its Packaging by 2022

(Credit: Sir Kensington’s)

Sir Kensington’s, a manufacturer of condiments and dressings, today announced it has set initial impact targets focused on sustainable agriculture, responsible packaging, and team impact. Two years after becoming a Certified B Corporation, Sir Kensington’s underscores its commitment to continuously measure and improve on its efforts for the betterment of all stakeholders.

After a process involving a materiality assessment, stakeholder conversations, and supply chain analysis, Sir Kensington’s set the following initial impact targets:

Supporting Sustainable Agriculture
While not a perfect proxy for sustainability, ‘organic’ certification is a label for food that has been produced using practices that promote ecological balance and biodiversity, without the use of synthetic chemicals. Fewer synthetic chemicals means it’s safer to consume, safer for the people who grow and harvest ingredients, and safer for soil and surrounding waterways.

Target: Double the volume of certified organic ingredients by 2023.

Progress: As of 2019, 15.7% of total ingredient volumes were certified organic. Currently, one product in Sir Kensington’s portfolio, Organic Mayonnaise, is fully certified organic.

To achieve this goal, Sir Kensington’s is currently working to transition all eggs used in its products to certified organic, while maintaining its Certified Humane Free Range commitment, for an even higher standard egg. As part of its broader sourcing strategy, the company is also identifying opportunities to carry the Fair Trade certification beyond its sweeteners to other at-risk product categories.

Using More Responsible Packaging
As a packaged foods company, Sir Kensington’s acknowledges that packaging can create unintentional harm. By measuring recyclability, increasing recycle rates, and sourcing recycled content, Sir Kensington’s seeks to address the potential impact at each stage in its packaging design process and take a 360-degree approach to the plastic challenge.

Target: Achieve 100% recyclable and 100% recycled content in rigid plastics and fiber (e.g. paper labels and corrugate) by 2022.

Progress:

• Rigid Plastics: Sir Kensington’s is currently using 3.5% post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastic by weight and is projected to reach 21.5% by November 2020.
• Fiber: The company currently estimates that 84.8% recycled content is used for corrugate by weight.

As a subsidiary of Unilever, Sir Kensington’s packaging targets also contribute to Unilever’s sustainable packaging goal to halve its use of virgin plastic in packaging and to collect and process more packaging than sold by 2025.