Embracing Sustainability: How Product Packaging Solutions Enhance Customer Experience
Resideo employees and customers highlight importance of efficient un-boxing experience
Erin Woodward*, Global Sustainability Director at Resideo
It’s estimated that packaging materials make up 28% of what’s in U.S. landfills.
In recent years, single-use plastics and excessive packaging waste are gradually giving way to sustainable packaging. In the U.S., 16 states have enacted statewide regulations around packaging waste, which tend to target single-use plastics, shopping bags, and increasing recycling targets.
Today, more consumers are seeking brands that prioritize environmentally friendly practices, making sustainable packaging a crucial factor for business success. For our part, Resideo is on a journey to use more sustainable packaging materials and eliminate materials where it makes sense.
An example of how this comes to fruition is the daily efforts of Raul Uranga, Packaging Engineer at Resideo and general believer in sustainability.
"As a father of two children, my most important goal in working at Resideo is to create a cleaner and brighter future, positively impacting the environment my children will grow up in," Raul said. "My team contributes to sustainability by reducing any potentially harmful materials in our packaging and reducing carbon emissions."
Raul and his team have improved the customer's unboxing experience by reducing the amount of material that is in the customer's hands and eliminating non-recyclable plastic materials. We are also actively working on improvements including the elimination of single-use plastic packaging materials, reducing printed paper installation manuals and optimizing the number of products per pallet cube.
It's a journey our customers are excited about.
Customer Inspires Packaging Redesign
Partnering with customers and listening to their needs with respect to environmental issues is a cornerstone to Resideo’s customer experience efforts. And one of my favorite sustainability stories from last year started with a challenge handed to us by one of our customers.
In 2022, Marvin Smith, the President of Orlando Emergency Signal and a member of Resideo’s First Alert Pro Premiere Partner Program, reached out to Raul and the Resideo team with a challenge.
"We love Resideo and the ProSeries product line, but we quickly realized its packaging was consuming a lot of space in our stockroom and trucks," Marvin said. "We have a rule to never leave packaging or waste with our clients and found ourselves filling multiple trash and recycle bags throughout a normal install day."
Marvin told Resideo that while the packaging kept the product free from damage during shipping, it was larger than required. Resideo shares Orlando Emergency Signal’s commitment to remove waste from homeowners’ homes and limit paperwork left during service and installation. Raul and the packaging team jumped into action and completely re-engineered our ProSeries 7-inch All-in-One Panel packaging.
"We redesigned the product’s molded pulp insert, corrugated box and printed sleeve to reduce box size by 44% compared to previous packaging, improve transportation and warehouse efficiency by increasing units per pallet by 226%," said Raul. "The project met our goal of pallet cube efficiency of 80% or better and uses eco-friendly materials with clear recycling symbols. The packaging reduction also saves $0.37 per unit, which is great for business."
Marvin and his team were excited to see the changes implemented.
“As a business owner, the benefit of this change has been huge,” Marvin said. “Our warehouse and trucks have a finite amount of available space. This packaging reduction reduces wasted space and increases productivity for my team. It also allows our trucks to stock more ancillary items necessary for installation and service calls.”
The design of this product’s packaging will be used on other Stock Keeping Units (SKUs) in the future and will serve as a blueprint for additional packaging re-engineering processes. Most importantly, our customers are happy and they see we share their values. Marvin said, “We have an amazing support system at Resideo. I consider them my Resideo family. When I saw the packaging changes, I couldn’t stop smiling. I knew Resideo was serious about improvement, but at that moment I knew we had made a positive change for our team and for the environment.”
Sustainable Packaging is Just the Beginning
Over the past few years in particular, Resideo has kicked off a number of sustainable packaging projects that are inspired by customers and industry best practices alike.
For example, we launched a pilot to remove the installation guide and replace it with QR codes for our Honeywell Home T6 non-connected thermostat, which is estimated to eliminate nearly 70,000 pounds of waste in the future.
In 2022, Resideo updated the packaging of our L1 WiFi Water Leak Shutoff Valve, which resulted in nearly 50% reduction in packaging material and packaging volume and 60% reduction in plastic packaging material. This product helped customers save an estimated 2.4 million gallons of water and $2.7 million in insurance claims in 2022 through avoided leaks. We went to market with the new L5 WiFi Water Leak Shutoff Valve in November 2022 and are proud that 99% of the packaging material is paper-based and eco-friendly.
These projects serve as a strong example of how Resideo seeks to reduce our impact from all angles, including how a product is designed, packaged and then used.
The packaging material for the L5 WiFi Water Leak Shutoff valve is 99% eco-friendly.
Ultimately the goal of responsibly designed, manufactured and packaged solutions is that they be good for the planet and good for our customers’ pocketbooks. Through our Green Horizons program, the framework by which we develop and measure sustainability, we consider the way our products and services impact customers, communities and the planet throughout their lifecycle phases.
Each day I'm motivated by how our employees and customers are embracing sustainability. It's thanks to leaders like Raul and Marvin that we're able to make an impact on our communities and to help protect what matters most.
For more information about Resideo's Environmental Social and Governance (ESG) commitment, read our latest ESG report at Resideo.com/sustainability.
*About Erin: Erin Woodward is based in Minnesota and served as a municipal development volunteer in the U.S., Peace Corps for two years in El Salvador, Central America. She leads sustainability for Resideo’s Products & Solutions business, where she champions bringing Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) into the business strategy and innovation pipeline. Erin sat on the steering committee for the Sustainable Growth Coalition, a business led partnership building collaborative circular economy projects to advance clean energy and protect and restore the natural water cycle.
Erin holds a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations and Spanish from Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire and a Master of Nonprofit Administration from Hamline University in St. Paul, Minn.
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