Vegan

Vegan definition

Packhelp defines vegan products as products that have no materials derived from animals or animal products. The production processes of these materials also use no animal products. 

Vegan products may also contain petroleum-based materials that take hundreds of thousands of years to decompose. Vegan certification for corrugated cardboard is also expensive and rarely, if ever, obtained. 

Why you should use vegan packaging products

A brand may decide to opt for vegan materials if veganism is a core value to them. Vegan products that don’t contain petroleum-based plastic are more likely to be biodegradable, recyclable and/or compostable. 

Why shouldn’t use vegan products

Non-vegan products used in the packaging industry are usually limited to hides, blood and sinew. All these materials are usually byproducts of the meat industry that would otherwise be thrown away. 

Sourcing vegan materials such as rubber trees and oils from plant crops is very labour and energy-intensive. This may result in a larger expenditure of fossil fuel compared to using animal by-products which is readily available.

On the other hand, the reason why animal by-products are readily available is because the demand is high. If companies like you and us start using more vegan products, they could eventually be a readily available material. Also, the huge impact of animal farming/livestock breeding and the resulting by-products cannot be ignored, so this isn’t all black and white.

Packhelp and vegan products

Glue that contains animal products was phased out of the printing industry approximately 15 years ago with the breakthrough of plant-based materials technology.

Packhelp products contain no animal products and by definition are vegan, but that does not mean that they are certified vegan. Certification would mean getting each raw material certified, then each individual order certified. This would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to carry out in practice with any reliability.