Amazon & Wal-Mart Combat “Wrap Rage”

Amazon is using its wide base of customer reviews to target companies that use frustrating-to-open packaging. And Wal-Mart is joining Amazon’s mission for simple and sustainable packaging with a goal of reducing all packaging %5 by 2013.

Amazon’s “Frustration-Free Packaging” initiative was inspired by some of the site’s notoriously entertaining customer reviews, like one complaining of scissors packaged in a plastic clam shell that required another pair of scissors to open. The program kicked off in 2008 with only 19 items featured. By 2011 the program featured 80,000 products.

Wal-Mart is now using a sustainability scorecard to help determine which products its buyers consider. The EPA reports that almost one-third of what winds up in landfills is packaging and that household waste increases 25% during the “holiday season” (between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day)

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