StrawToGold SIGNED

Project "StrawToGold" data sheet

The following table provides information about the project.

 Partnership

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Map

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 Project objective

STRAWTOGOLD uses straw for the first commercially viable, ecological alternative to polystyrene which has considerable environmental drawbacks and negative impacts on human health. Lack of sustainable packaging solutions is particularly a challenge for companies producing fresh goods or those sensitive to shock or temperature such as consumer electronics and pharmaceuticals. Landpack has used its broad engineering expertise and its farming background to patent a process for treating straw fibers to create a plastic material with outstanding performance in terms of shock absorbance, insulation and humidity regulation. A four step heating, de-moisturizing, pressing and packaging process creates an end product which has the potential reduce the billions of tons of plastic in our environment. Our fully biodegradable products are sold just below Styrofoam’s average price at €3.2/piece with the same excellent insulation and cooling properties and shock absorption capacity. It is 9% cheaper than its alternative, occupies 60% less space for cheaper transport, disposal and storage costs and uses 95% less energy in production. Furthermore, the final product has been praised by our customers for its aesthetic appeal to enhance their branding. While STRAWTOGOLD has already proven its potential to disrupt the status quo of packaging in the e-food sector with 500 established customers, as a next step we are looking to industrialize and fully automate our current production and create a model for scaling our plants to advance the sustainability of the pharma and industrial sectors. We are currently turning 900 tons of straw into 250,000 boxes/year on our almost fully automated production line which we will optimize and upscale to produce 2 million boxes/year to replace 0.02% of the current Styrofoam packaging in Europe. Given the low cost of our primary materials, we have significant profit margins (80%) and expect to generate a total of €19 million in revenue by 2021.