What’s The Coca-Cola Company doing to save the planet? Quite a lot.
World Without Waste is the company’s ambitious initiative that addresses a very global problem.
“Nobody can look at the news today without seeing something about plastic in the ocean,” Karas says.
“When you look at our business, we put everything in a package,” Karas continues. “It’s in an aluminum can, a plastic bottle, maybe a glass contour bottle.”
Aware of its impact, The Coca-Cola Company set an ambitious goal to take in what it puts out in a big way.
“In 2018, we set this goal, because we knew there was this packaging problem and we had to be part of the solution,” Karas explained. “So World Without Waste means that by 2030, we’re going to collect the equivalent of every bottle and can we sell globally. Along with that, every package will have 50% recycled content. So think of every aluminum can, every glass bottle.”
But how does The Coca-Cola Company plan to carry out the global sustainability endeavor on a local level in its home market of Atlanta? The company has implemented an on-the-ground program called Feet on the Street, where they counsel city residents on the right way to recycle.
“One of the things we’ve found in our research: Sometimes people are skeptical that things actually get recycled,” Karas explains.
Feet on the Street comes in to educate residents, inspecting their recycling containers to ensure everything inside is recyclable. And if everything can’t? “We’re going out and looking in those containers before they’re picked up, and put an ‘oops’ tag on it,” Karas says.
The program proved a success. After approximately six weeks of piloting Feet on the Street in a small section of the city, there was a 56% reduction in contamination, as well as an increase in the amount of materials that the company collected.