Day 4 - Packaging

My affinity for Starbucks aside, I generally like to spend my money at privately owned businesses, and that includes my drug store.  This morning as I waited for a prescription to be filled, I decided to splurge a buck on some emery boards and file my nails while I waited.  Not because my nails actually needed filing, but because I quickly discovered that a small drug store is the least conducive store to browsing in the world.

So, I sat down with my purchase and removed the cardboard backing.  However, this was the type of packaging that toothbrushes and compact powders come in, and on such packaging the cardboard never actually comes completely off.  It peels apart leaving a second layer of cardboard to get through, only the second layer is always completely flush with the plastic front leaving nothing to grip and remove it with.  I used my fingernail to jab through the remaining layer, breaking the corner of my nail in the process.  Luckily, I had just the thing with which to file the jagged edge.  Sort of.  With the cardboard barrier successfully breeched, I removed the emery boards to find them shrink-wrapped tightly together with a thick layer of plastic.  Really?

So I pulled and I poked and I scratched, and three broken fingernails later, I had access to my emery boards AND a use for them.  It was win/win.  But it got me thinking about the new obsession with putting thick molded plastic around everything valued at $9.99 and above.  I get that manufacturers want to make it difficult to peel open packaging and steal their products, but who came up with the no-seam, slices-you-open-if-you-open-with-scissors packaging model?  Somehow, packaging companies have figured out a way to mold non-pliable plastic around the product so tightly that it can’t be penetrated by any of my household utensils.  I would love to know how that boardroom conversation went down.  “How do we keep people from stealing this?”  “Let’s make it impossible to open.”  “Don’t be ridiculous.  The customer has to open it.”  “Let’s make it ALMOST impossible to open.”  “Now you’re thinking.”

Environmentally speaking, this stuff has got to be lethal.  So where are the protests and the petitions?  Plastic water bottles barely stand up on their own anymore because the thinner plastic has been deemed more environmentally sound, and yet I’m still an earth-hater if I purchase one.  So why isn’t anyone clamoring about this packaging that is thick enough to sever an artery?

For now, I’ve come up with a plan of attack that keeps my skin intact.  I use both hands to get my scissor blades through the outer lip of the packaging, cut a large circle around the edge and then in  a spiral pattern cut closer and closer to the product and BAM!  Four hours later I can use my purchase.