HealthPak’s innovation brings together SKYCITY and Fonterra to create recycling success story

Published on May 24, 2018

One of Health Pak’s most innovative recycling projects has earnt the backing of two of New Zealand’s biggest names in business.

When we first developed our 100% recycled Eco.logic bottles back in 2014, we used a process that would create six shampoo bottles out of one 2-litre Anchor lightproof milk bottle – a ground-breaking idea that gives these revolutionary bottles a second lease of life and that is better for the environment by helping to reduce waste.

This process has now been picked up by our friends at SKYCITY, for whom we developed a customised range of guest amenities called Puriri based around New Zealand native botanicals – and what better way to bring together two archetypal Kiwi brands such as SKYCITY and Fonterra, than through the thoroughly Kiwi pursuit of being actively environmentally aware.

The Puriri range throughout all SKYCITY’s hotels is now 100% made using these recycled – and recyclable – bottles, many of which started out life being delivered as lightproof bottles to SKYCITY’s Sky Café.

Once used to help fuel visitors and guests with their morning flat whites and lattes, those empty bottles are collected once more by an Anchor milkman, who takes them to Auckland-based recycling company Astron Sustainability, where they’re washed, ground down and converted via a commercial process into a pellet that can be delivered to us here in Penrose.

Our general manager sales & marketing, Jimi Kennedy-Grant says the beauty of the system is that it creates a “closed loop”.

“Because SKYCITY is creating its own Puriri range bottles out of its own recycled lightproof milk bottles, and then those same Puriri bottles can also be recycled as well, they’ve effectively created a recycling loop that absolutely minimises waste – what a perfect example of a well thought through, environmentally friendly scheme,” Jimi says.

“And what’s more, because SKYCITY and Fonterra are two of the biggest and most recognisable brands in New Zealand, the fact that they are using the sort of innovation we’re developing here at HealthPak really helps light the way for other companies to follow.

“Just imagine if all the country’s hotel brands were as forward-thinking, they could all develop their own customised guest amenities using a recycled product that literally gets delivered to their door every day. What a good story that would be for each and every one of them.”

Fonterra and SKYCITY have called their recycling project Moo2Shampoo and their first bottles rolled off our production line and into their hotels in November. They hope the scheme will see 35,000 milk bottles recycled locally and will be endorsed by the Ministry for the Environment as a product stewardship initiative.

SKYCITY’s Environmental Manager Courtney Simpson says she’s highly motivated to push schemes whereby whoever designs, produces, sells, or uses a product takes responsibility for minimising the product’s environmental impact throughout all stages of the product’s lifecycle.

“I am a big fan of product stewardship schemes, and the exciting part of this project was working with Fonterra and seeing that partnership work for us both. I hope this project will inspire others to develop more initiatives like this, big or small,” says Courtney.

SKYCITY Entertainment Group’s CEO Graeme Stephens says the “innovative partnership shows the possibility and power of businesses working together to create shared solutions that reduce environmental impact”.

 “We’re working on a number of different projects to reduce our environmental footprint, and hope this is just the first of many successful partnerships like this," Graeme says.  

For more information on HealthPak’s innovative environmental schemes and customised guest amenities, contact us on +64 9 579 6268, at info@healthpak.co.nz or contact us via the website.