Free Orville Redenbacher's New Caramel & White Cheddar Popcorn from Influenster Comes With Inflated Packaging

On Friday, I received a very large cardboard box from the post carrier. I was confused as to what it was, until I turned it over and saw the Orville Redenbacher's logo on the other side. I knew that Influenster was sending me something from Orville Redenbacher's for free to review on their app, so from the size of the box (over one foot long, at least eight inches wide, and several inches deep), I thought there must be more than one product that I would be reviewing.

What could be in this giant cardboard box?

But there wasn't. When I opened the large cardboard box, there was just one foil bag of Orville Redenbacher's new Caramel & White Cheddar Popcorn and a card.

This was all that I found in the box.

That's a lot of extra room in the box for this one bag of popcorn and card.

I was heartened to see it was a flavour combination that I could get into, caramel and white cheddar, but then I felt the bag. It was mostly empty. I know people here might interject about "slack fill" to prevent crushing of the popcorn in transit, but surely 3/5 - 4/5 of the bag doesn't need to be empty to preserve the integrity of the popcorn. Why not just make the bag smaller and use less resources in its manufacture?

A bag of Caramel & White Cheddar popcorn.

The bag looked very big, so it seemed like there would be a lot of popcorn inside.

But there was actually a lot of empty bag.

This is what I found when I actually opened the bag. It looked almost empty.

Now, onto the popcorn itself. It was well preserved in transit, no doubt due to its huge armored box and the excessive slack fill. The popcorn was very fresh. It tasted like caramel corn from a country fair mixed with Smart Food, this kind of white cheddar popcorn snack that I remember from my youth. The sweet and salty combination was pleasant. And when I didn't feel salty or didn't feel sweet, I could just pick one or the other out (they're just mixed half and half in the bag together). My husband is not a big fan of mixed sweet and salty snacks and he even liked it, so that's quite a compliment because he's picky.

Caramel corn is mixed equally with white cheddar popcorn.

If you're a fan of salty and sweet combo snacks and you like popcorn, you'll probably like this.

So, the product itself tasted really good to me, but the packaging has a ways to go. It seems wasteful to me. I am not a fan of overpackaging, so the snack's tastiness was somewhat tainted by this. All the same, I'm glad to have been given this item to review and to add my two cents.

*** I received this product for free from Orville Redenbacher's Canada via Influenster, but opinions expressed in this post are my own.*** #OrvilleCWC @OrvilleCanada +Influenster

Overpackaged Oreos

I was stunned the other day when I saw how many components go into an Oreo package now. When I was a child they had some cardboard and a plastic covered papery bag and that was it. I would have thought that packaging would have decreased over the intervening 30 years, but it has in fact increased. What a disappointment (and Oreos don't taste as good as they used to either- what a pity).

To their credit, there's not a lot of spare space in the bag or tray.

Oreos are now housed in a plastic tray, with cardboard layered under it (I have no idea why), and then a plastic bag around it.

The plastic bag, houses a plastic tray.

When the plastic tray is removed, one finds a slab of cardboard under it. Why is this needed?

This is a lot of packaging for cookies. Can't the company reduce the packaging somehow without compromising the integrity of the cookies?

Surely there's a simpler and less wasteful way of packaging a bag of cookies. The current packaging for Oreos by Nabisco (owned by Mondelez) uses more resources than are needed. This is another example of overpackaging.

Titanic Toothpaste Tube Housing is a Waste

Some products do not come in boxes. They are housed in their own package from which they are used and then a safety seal is placed over the opening of them to show that they have not been opened or used. Some examples would include certain brands of lipstick, eyeliner, mouthwash, drinks, etc. I am mystified as to why this isn't done with toothpaste.

My husband brought home two different types of toothpaste the other day. One was Sensodyne Multi-Action. The other was Crest 3D White Luxe. When we opened the boxes that housed the tubes of toothpaste, we were amazed by how much empty space there was inside the box.

When placing the tubes of toothpaste by the boxes that they were packaged in, one can see how much further waste is being created. Not only is the box a waste to begin with, but the larger than necessary box is further waste (and look at how colourful and fancy the boxes are, they're not just plain cardboard, so, again further resources wasted).  No one is going to reuse a toothpaste box, so this colourful marvel is going straight into the recycling box (at least it is recyclable), never to be used again.

Sensodyne Multi-Action:

This box is way too long for the tube of toothwaste. What a waste.

Crest 3D White Luxe:

This box isn't as long, but it's longer than necessary and wider than necessary.

I've read that there's an exception in packaging rules that allow manufacturers to package items that they think are vulnerable to shoplifting in larger than necessary packages, so perhaps that's how these manufacturers are justifying their very large and unnecessary boxes around tubes of toothpaste. I doubt toothpaste is a hot item for shoplifting, so this explanation doesn't work for me. I don't understand why a safety seal, either sticker or a bit of plastic around the neck wouldn't make a better, less wasteful packaging solution for tubes of toothpaste.

This is overpackaging.

Profuse Pomelo Packaging Strikes Again

My husband picked up a pomelo the other day at the grocery store and sure enough, it came packaged just like the last one I bought. We're not sure if this is some new trend, as we never used to see packaging on pomelos before, but it should stop. It's wasteful and unnecessary overpackaging that uses precious resources for no reason at all.

A pomelo is a citrus fruit that has a perfect package of its own. Its peel is thick and certainly doesn't need to be surrounded by a mesh net, plastic wrap, and a plastic ribbon (this one had pictures of fruit on it instead of pandas like in my last pomelo post).

The mesh net and ribbon are not recyclable as far as I can figure and will end up in the landfill.

This is heading to the landfill and it's not even necessary.

The plastic cling wrap, while one might throw it into a bag of old shopping bags and take it to a recycling facility, will probably be thrown out by most people and in any event is totally unnecessary.

Who knows what the purpose of this plastic cling wrap is.

 This is such a prime example of overpackaging, a package, around packaging, around fruit that has its own package.

All of this packaging for a single piece of fruit that's in its own package!

This beautiful and very large citrus (pomelos taste rather like a milder or sweeter grapefruit and are thought to be what grapefruits may have originated from) does not need this package. It is not fragile and vulnerable to squishing like a mandarin orange. Some of them you could probably break a window with they're so large and heavy, so I don't know how cling wrap and plastic mesh and ribbons are contributing to protecting them in transit or preserving them in the store.

The pomelo looks beautiful on its own, not wrapped in layers of wasteful plastic.

With a peel this thick there's no need for all that plastic.

Clearly, this is yet another example of overpackaging.

NeilMed NasoGel Nasal Spray has Needless Bulk

My husband bought a saline nasal spray to use on the airplane the other day. I opened the box of NeilMed NasoGel Spray so that he could pack the nasal spray and was astounded by all of the packaging.

Who would guess that inside this box there is a hermetically sealed bottle along with enough paper to create a piñata?

The nasal spray was not particularly big, perhaps a few inches high and an inch wide, but the box that it came in was much bigger. I don't even understand why it was in a box, because the nasal spray was completely sealed in plastic all the way around it's bottle and nozzle and cap.

So much extra space at the top of the box.

Why is this box so big?

Inside the box there was not one, but three enclosures. There was a big English pamphlet with various ads for the company's products, a French language ad pamphlet (these are both glossy and colourful and quite thick), and a sheet of coupons for other products made by the same company, but not a coupon for the product that one just purchased (so I would think less likely to be used).

Nasal spray, box, and a pile of different enclosures.

English and French versions of voluminous advertising and some coupons. All highly coloured and glossy.

Both ad books were this thick. Why is there so much paper?

I didn't get a shot of the plastic wrap that came off of of the bottle, because my husband took it off on the plane, but that's packaging too. Why was this item even put in a box? There is an exception that allows companies to use excessive packaging to prevent shoplifting, but honestly if everyone used that exception, the world would be filled to the brim with packaging, since criminals will steal whatever they have the will and desire to steal, regardless of size. NeilMed NasoGel Spray is definitely a prime example of overpackaging.

Plethoric Pomelo Packaging

I was at the grocery store the other day in the produce section. I noticed that pomelos are in season again. I was thrilled and bought one. It was only when I took it home that I noticed how complex and excessive the packaging around it was. First of all, for those who don't know what pomelos are, they're a citrus fruit from Asia that are related to grapefruit and taste sort of like a sweeter or milder grapefruit. As everyone knows, citrus fruits have their own natural package, a peel. So, they shouldn't need any package (I'm waiting for someone in the comments section to come up with some B.S. reason for this extra packaging that comes from the citrus distributors themselves and not from actual fact).

Despite its thick and protective peel (the thickness of a grapefruit peel), this pomelo was wrapped in a mesh net, with a fake leaf on top, and a plastic ribbon around with panda bears on it (something threatened with extinction and it's on something that using tons of resources and therefore threatening the environment how bizarre).

After I took the mesh net off with scissors, I found that the pomelo was wrapped in plastic wrap. Why?!

It was a package (peel) surrounded by a plastic package, surrounded by a mesh net package, surrounded by plastic ribbon with a fake leaf on top.

This is a crazy amount of packaging for just one piece of fruit that already comes in a package. I should also point out that other than the plastic wrap which could be recycled with shopping bags, none of the packaging was recyclable so it will be going to the landfill (other than the citrus peel, which is of course compost).

What will we see next? Bananas in plastic wrap and bags? This is a prime example of overpackaging.

Misleading Doritos

I bought a bag of Doritos the other day. The front of the bag said 25 grams more. It certainly looked like a very big bag of Doritos.

The bag looks gigantic, but those who are expecting a ton of Doritos will be disappointed when they open the bag.

But when I opened the bag, it was only half full.

This is not the bag after I had a snack attack. This is what it looked like when I opened it. What a waste of packaging!

The fill line is where my thumb is. So what's the point of the other half of the bag? Do we just want extra garbage for the landfill (after all this package is not even recyclable)?

Why do companies like Frito-Lay (who makes Doritos), insist on using giant packages and only filling them part way? They would save money if they used packages that fit the amount of product being sold, instead of something much bigger than is needed. I know that they think that they're fooling us into buying things by making them look bigger than they are, but once the consumer opens the package and sees that they've been shortchanged and duped, they're going to be annoyed (and you know the saying, fool me once . . .) . So why don't these companies just use less packaging and therefore less resources. The way things are now, we're just all annoyed by companies thinking that consumers are idiots and by the overpackaging that's going on in the world.