Uriah is a health and wellness company with 185 years of history that, in recent years, has consolidated itself into natural consumer healthcare. The challenge for Unedited was to create guidelines to eco-design the entire packaging system of Uriach and its brands following the principles of the circular economy.
The starting point was a diagnosis of the sustainability of Uriach packaging systems. To do this, information was collected about the packaging of each company brand based on sustainability criteria such as the origin of the materials, the content of recycled materials and the recyclability of the packaging. The focus was especially on increasing eco-design strategies in the best-selling packaging types, and it is for this reason that the impact of each packaging was analyzed taking into account the recurrence of sales per packaging unit and within each brand. Once this was done, ecodesign strategies were defined and, together with the Uriach team, those were prioritized according to the degree of alignment with the company's vision and objectives and their urgency due to regulations, competition or demand for the consumers.
The result is a guide with detailed instructions to implement each of the strategies of ecodesign, which explains how this strategy aligns with Uriach's objectives and why it is relevant for the company and sustainability. Each strategy includes a section with indicators that demonstrate how it aligns with business objectives, and feasibility is assessed in terms of the company's capabilities and the urgency to implement them, as well as environmental benefits.
The guide is the basis for Uriach to apply ecodesign criteria both in the the packaging primary and secondary design of all its brands. It also includes a detailed methodology that could be replicated in the event that new eco-design strategies are to be defined in the future.
