20 March, 2010

Sunchips Introduces First Eco-friendly Chip Bag

I love Sunchips. For a long time, they've been one of my favorite snack foods because they have the satisfaction of chips and the sweetness of the whole grains in them. Together, they conquer not only my appetite but also my craving for delicious chippy goodness.

On Earth Day this year, Frito-Lay introduced the first ever completely biodegradable chip bag. In thirteen weeks, this bag (made of completely renewable plant fibers,) will completely decompose. The chips inside are the same Sunchips you know and love; only the bag is different. However, this bag does have an extremely annoying quality to it: It's one loud bag. The fibers that make up the bag are all completely natural, so the construction of the bag makes it sound very much like a cross between a space blanket and a sheet of tinfoil.

Link: Sunchips Website

6 comments:

Andrew said...

Not the bag to sneak into the movies, I guess....
What happens if the Sunchips are still in the bad when it biodegrades?

Dave said...

This bag will inspire murder in movie theaters.

I think it takes actual composting action to get it to biodegrade. But...I had an elderly aunt who used to save bags. When cereal companies started using plastic instead of waxed paper liners in the boxes, she even saved those bags. So if frugal grannies try to use them for moist food storage in the fridge, and the stuff starts to get a little funky on the back shelves... that could be kind of cool.

Unknown said...

I also love Sunchips and just got my first noisy bag. I would just tell people to put a serving in another plastic bag or container to take to the movies as we need to celebrate their attempt at being green. One reason I buy this is that it uses sunflower oil instead of canola oil so common today and wish people would boycott that as it is an industrial oil that is from the Rape seed and even insects won't eat it.

For this reason, I AVOID all canola oil products. I don't make a habit of even sunchips as it still has artifical color Blue 1, Red 40 and I always wonder what they mean by "natural flavors" Nevertheless, if I don't make my own popcorn with olive and coconut oil from scratch, I'll buy this over other brands...unless an organic type is on sale as I am a chip lover.

Dave said...

chellamia: In fact, canola oil is not the same product as industrial rapeseed oil. Canola oil is produced from a special cultivar developed by selective breeding at the University of Manitoba in the late 1960's. It has a completely different nutritional profile from standard rapeseed oil, and is extremely low in erucic acid and glucosinolates.

You are, of course, free to avoid any ingredient you wish, but I doubt there will be any widespread boycott of canola oil anytime soon.

Anonymous said...

WHAT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU. THE BAG IS TOO FREAKING LOUD! WE BOUGHT SOME AT OUR LOCAL TARGET AND IT WAS DEAFENING!

SunChips said...

Dave, thanks for posting about the new SunChips compostable bag. We’re so happy to hear you are supportive of our efforts. If you’d like to learn more, please visit www.sunchips.com or become a fan of us on Facebook – www.facebook.com/sunchips.