Changes to Milk Packaging

Milk used to be delivered by electric vehicle, to our doorstep, in plain, reusable glass bottles. It sounds like an ideal scenario, however, supermarket price wars made it cheaper to buy in-store. Price, and the convenience of picking up a pint with your other shopping, made the milk round a thing of the past.

Since then, the majority of milk has been sold in single-use plastic containers. Coloured lids made it easy to spot whether you were picking up skimmed, semi-skimmed or full-fat milk and labels provide nutritional information and best before dates.

Environmental Concerns Are Informing Packaging Changes

With 96% of the population buying milk each week, the environmental impact is great and things need a shake up. We might not be dashing back to the milkman just yet, but changes are happening.

Firstly, a growing number of plastic bottles are now made from at least 30% recycled plastic. This shift has helped brands to avoid paying plastic tax!

Secondly, Waitrose, Aldi, M&S and Lidl are among the supermarkets to switch coloured lids for clear plastic. Unlike coloured lids, the clear ones can be recycled into food grade plastic.

Finally, Use By dates are being replaced by Best Before dates or no dates at all. Customers are being encouraged to trust sniff testing instead. This is in response to WRAP research that suggests as much as 490 million pints of milk are wasted every year.

Find out more about why M&S have made changes to milk packaging.