Holiday Wrappin’
by Jac
The holidays are a great time to practice greening up your gift wrap game! Consider these ways you could reduce wrapping waste:
If every family reused just two feet of holiday ribbon, the 38,000 miles of ribbon saved could tie a bow around the entire planet.
If every American family wrapped just 3 presents in re-used materials, it would save enough paper to cover 45,000 football fields.
The 2.65 billion Christmas cards sold each year in the U.S. could fill a football field 10 stories high. If we each sent one card less, we’d save 50,000 cubic yards of paper.
Additionally, most wrapping paper and tissue paper is NOT recyclable! If it is textured, glittery, foil stamped, or tissue, it cannot be recycled. Most ribbons are also made from plastic materials and definitely cannot be recycled.
Since wrapping materials are so challenging to recycle, Go Green Glen Ellyn recommends REDUCING and REUSING your wrapping materials as much as possible! You'll also save money from having to buy new paper and bags each year.
Also, when it comes to holiday greeting cards, consider a postcard. Postcards use less paper since there's no envelope, and they use less postage so are less expensive to mail (for every 100 holiday greetings, you would save at least $20!). We like Paper Culture, which is printed on 100% post consumer recycled paper (meaning no new trees are cut to make cards) and plants a tree for every order! *
DO - Actions you can take
Shop your house to see you what you can use as wrapping paper! Some of our favorite ideas include:
Soft wrapping: hand towels, reusable gift sacks, scarves
Paper wrapping: maps, newspaper, kids' artwork, brown paper bags, stuffing paper from packages
Funky wrapping: Balloons or potato chip bags cut open and washed can give a metallic look
Ribbon replacements: SAVE your ribbons year to year, try twine or reusable gift bows
Fillers: Use a hole punch to make confetti from leaves or scrap paper, cut kids artwork into strips to tuck into gift bags
Send us a pic of how you #giftgreener, and we might feature it in an upcoming newsletter! Happy Holidays!
*(FYI, we have no affiliate marketing relationship and would always tell you if we did!).
