Comments on Beth's review of Original Toothbrush
Original Toothbrush
Description: Ergonomic sustainable toothbrush.
Not entirely sustainable
While it's great that the handle is made from natural cellulose, the case is made from virgin plastic. The company claims that it is recyclable, but since most areas will not accept a case like that for recycling, for practical purposes it is not recyclable. Just because an item has a recycling code does not mean it can be recycled.
This company has looked into accepting the toothbrushes back for recycling and decided against it. I prefer the Preserve toothbrush from Recycline (http://www.recycline.com) which is not only made from post-consumer recycled plastic, but can also be sent back to the manufacturer to be recycled further. Recycline has come closer than any other toothbrush maker that I've found to closing the recycling loop.
Beth's keywords: toothbrush, dental
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Kevin F. says:
Hi Beth,
Thanks for the comments - it is great to get feedback if you are a manufacturer.
We switched to SmartCycle® plastic for the outer packaging about six months ago. This is made from 50% recycled soda bottles (of which only 24% of the 6.5 billion pounds used per year are recycled). The card back is 35% recycled content and we hope that we can bump this number up. The Original lasts about 3 times longer than an ordinary toothbrush (survey of 1680 users done in 2001). All the packaging is curbside recyclable (PET and paper).
The other great advantage of this packaging style is that it is lightweight. Reducing packaging weight and shipping weight is crucial. Few people ever think about the oil wasted in shipping a toothbrush and its attendant packaging across the country. Our calculations indicate that it consumes more oil than making a new handle would take. Since toothbrushes cannot be recycled as toothbrushes (tiny staples in the head will break the machine) they end up in crude objects, such as a plastic park bench, as a very oil-intensive filler.
Another issue never mentioned by other toothbrush makers is that the largest part of the energy involved in toothbrushes is in molding the handle. All of our molding machines are electric and use 75% less energy. All other brands do not make their own toothbrushes and probably have no idea how much energy goes into making their product. They do, however have plenty of spare time to write some thrilling ad copy.
many thanks - Kevin Foley, founder and President of RADIUS Toothbrush.