What makes UrthPact products stand out from the large crowd of other compostable, single-use products out there? Is it that we are 100% Made in the USA? Or that our products are made in a Safe Quality Food certified facility? What about our fully customizable and unique branding experience for our straws? While all of these things are what make us who we are, one trait stands out when it comes to our mission to save the world from plastic: all of our products are certified compostable, whether it’s TUV Industrial, TUV Home, or BPI (Biodegradable Products Institute). Many of our product lines even hold multiple certifications, just to prove that we really are what we say we are. We believe in providing our customers (and their customers in turn) with high quality products that are true to their word: to break down anywhere on Earth in under a year.
Where’s our proof?
By certifying our compostable products, we’re backing up our claims with hard science, and the backing of a reputable third party certifying body. It’s not just us saying that our products are compostable; we have the data and facts to prove it. And depending on the product line, we’ve done this multiple times over. Take our straws for example. We started out by passing the test standard AS 5810 for home compost, which then in turn led to a TUV Home certification (for full breakdown, both chemical and physical, in under 1 year). But when our customers said that wasn’t enough, that no one even knew what home compost was yet, we went 2 steps further. We also obtained a TUV Industrial certification, which in turn allowed us to obtain a BPI certification as well. Even though BPI and TUV Industrial are essentially the same certification (the only real difference being that TUV is based in Austria and BPI is based in the USA), we took it upon ourselves to ensure we covered every base to protect our partners and their customers.
Having a certified compostable product also makes it more likely to comply with newer plastics bans that are rolling out across the country. Many newer bans are utilizing certification and test standards as gateways for which compostables are allowed under the ban (check out Charleston, SC for an example), and those that don’t have certifications written into their bans are actively being contested to include them. Having a certified product like UrthPact’s protects you and your business from any legal consequences, whether that be from plastics bans or greenwashing laws. Certifications ensure that there is no greenwashing here; all of our claims are 100% backed by scientific lab testing and field results.
Now, certifications aren’t perfect. They are timely and costly to obtain, and when you certify a product for compostability or biodegradability in multiple environments, you have to obtain multiple certifications, increasing both the time to get them certified and the cost to do so. We get it, the system isn’t perfect. But we’ve already done all of that work for you. And, if there’s a certification we don’t have that you need, we’ll work to obtain that certification to ensure you can communicate honestly with your customers about our products. We know that honesty and integrity are key elements when it comes to compostable single-use products. There are a lot of skeptics in this industry. It’s up to us to prove them wrong.
To learn more about the certifications held by UrthPact products, click the links below:
Straws: TUV Home, TUV Industrial, BPI, CMA-I, and certified marine degradable material under TUV Marine
Cutlery: TUV Industrial and BPI
Coffee Pods (Rings): TUV Industrial, BPI, and TUV Home (coming soon!)
Degassing Valves: TUV Industrial, BPI (coming soon!), and TUV Home (coming soon!)
Juice Bottles: passed ASTM D6400, TUV Industrial (coming soon!)
