Industry Solutions

Sustainability shouldn’t have an expiration date. Life cycle management is a formal part of our product introduction process worldwide. When we develop a new product, we ask important questions at the start: How can we reduce the product’s impact on the environment? How will we distribute it? And how will it ultimately be disposed of? We consider all the environmental, health and safety implications of bringing that particular product into the world.

We adopted a new Life Cycle Management Policy in 2001 requiring all of our business units to conduct life cycle reviews for all new and existing products. With hundreds of new products introduced each year, we have a continuous flow of opportunities to improve the environmental, health and safety effects of the things we make.

We’re thinking outside the box. Also the carton, wrapper, and bag. A key part of our life cycle management process is our ongoing effort to realise the environmental and cost benefits of reduced packaging. We’re reducing the environmental impact of our packaging through redesign, reuse, increased recyclability and use of recycled content, and increased use of cube utilisation. The results are less energy use in processing packaging materials, reduced cost and emissions from transport, and less storage and disposal space requirements.

We’ve significantly reduced the packaging of our 3M Scotch-Brite™ Tub and Tile Scrubber. The package redesign includes the removal of corrugate dividers and a diminished overall size to fit into half the transport and display space.

For those who thought high-school geometry would never serve them in real life, consider the power of the cube. In warehousing and logistics, “cube utilisation” is an approach to using the space within a storage area, trailer or container most efficiently. Cube utilisation is generally calculated as a percentage of total space or total “usable space.” We’re using cube utilisation to reduce the storage and transportation space required by our products.