Supermarkets Snap Up Eco-Bin Liners

By David Wilcock

A family-run composting business has clinched a deal with two supermarket giants.

Recycle Together has signed contracts with national Tesco and Somerfield stores to stock its Alina paper compost bin liners.

The liners are strong and water resistant yet bio-degradable and the company, run by Gordon and Lesley Anderson with their son Russell, hopes it will make inroads into the burgeoning market for green alternatives.

Alina began as a home-made solution to the problem of how to store compostable material in a clean yet environmentally friendly container.

Mrs Anderson says: "Our local council introduced a composting regime, meaning people had to store degradable waste for collection. They supplied us with bins to keep it in, but they’d quickly get very messy.

"My husband and I searched the market for a strong paper liner but it didn’t exist. Instead, we got a British company to design one made from a combination of sack and craft papers. The result is Alina, which comes in several shapes and sizes and bears the European Certificate of Compostability. This means councils will allow them to be composted on communal sites because they break down without producing toxins."

The bags are already sold in Asda, Co-op, Spar, Budgens and Londis stores across the region and are currently being trialled by Waitrose.

The company recently used a loan from Finance South West to move to bigger premises on the Halwell Business Park near Totnes.

Finance South West loan fund manager Chris Burt said: "Recycle Together now has the capacity it needs to keep Tesco and Somerfield supplied throughout the UK. We liked the fact that Alina is entirely eco-friendly and are pleased to support a company that will promote the message that the South West is an innovative, yet green peninsula."

The announcement comes at the start of Recycle Week. The annual event, which is now in its fifth year, is organised by Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP) in partnership with the leading materials recycling organisations.

Fridey Cordingley, head of WRAP’s national recycling campaign Recycle Now, which spearheads the event, said: "Sometimes we don’t realise how much of our household waste can be easily recycled, or we think that recycling one more thing won’t make a real difference.

"Recycle Week aims to inspire us all to try and recycle a bit more and highlight that there is a real benefit in doing so."

"We are pleased that it remains a key annual focus for the Recycle Now campaign."

(c) 2008 Western Morning News, The Plymouth (UK). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.