cd packaging design problem

CD Packaging

Introduction

After a discussion about cd packaging for the next defiance, ohio CD, and Ryan’s desire to move away from the polybagged format, I’ve thought a lot about CD packaging. I recently read the book Cradle to Cradle which discusses designing consumer products that can be re-used and have the lowest environmental impact. The environment is important to me, but I’m not going to go back to school and get a career as an environmental scientist of activist. I am, however, a producer of a consumer product, compact disks, and just as I object when corporations produce things that are toxic or wasteful, and demand that they work on making the products smarter, I have an obligation to do the same with the products that I produce. As a result, I’ve been trying to find out information on making more environmentally intelligent packaging for Defiance, Ohio CDs.

Background

The Status Quo

In the past, Defiance, Ohio has packaged all of its mass-produced CDs in polybags from Bags Unlimited, much like the early Plan-It-X releases. The artwork was photocopied, cut, stamped, and assembled ourselves.

The Future (or the problem with polybags)

As the volume of CDs we have to make increases and as it becomes more difficult to get interesting looking (i.e. spot-color) or inexpensive photocopies, and due to the aesthetic limitations of photocopied inserts, manufacturing the cover artwork ourselves is undesireable. So, in the future, we will probably have our cover artwork printed. According to Ryan, it is in most cases cheaper to get a package deal that includes printing, CD pressing, and jewel case packaging.

Question: What are the cost differences between printing covers, buying polybags, and pressing CDs seperately vs. buying a jewel case package deal?

Answer: From Bellweather, CDs w/ Jewel Cases and 4/1 inserts/traycards cost $1125/1000 or $1.13/CD

Also, one issue that Ryan has raised with polybagged CDs in general is that the average CD consumer, who isn’t involved with the DIY scene or ethic perceives the choice of polybag packaging not out of a desire to use fewer materials or to minimize the cost of the product to the consumer, but as a mark of the illegitimacy of the band. The argument, which I think is reasonable, is that having a cheap CD that is perceived the same as a major label CD has far more impact in terms of explaining the economic ethics of DIY punk.

Furthermore, polybagged CDs are often relegated to some obscure bin of a record store where they are inaccessible to all but the hipsters who know what they’re looking for. Unfortunately, this is also a legitimate concern.

Ryan also mentioned that he felt like polybagged CDs were less durable. I don’t think that this is as much of an issue and I chalk this up to Ryan’s general dislike and, as a result, mistreatment of CDs than anything else. I have had as many beverages leak through the cracks in a jewel case, or have bent artwork sloppily inserting it into a jewel case as I have with a polybag. Additionally, if I play a CD a lot, it usually gets taken out of the case and put in a multi-CD caddy of some sort anyway. I think this is fairly consistent with most CD users.

The easiest, and most economical alternative to the polybag is the venerable jewel case. This is the standard format for compact disk packaging and a package deal that includes cd pressing, artwork printing, and jewel case packaging is a relatively inexpensive.

The Problem with Jewel Cases

To me, jewel cases seem really wasteful. There is a lot of material there that can, at best, be downcycled and will, at worst, end up in a landfill. Downcycle is a term that is used in Cradle to Cradle which describes the reality of much recycling where the amount of recovered material is small, the applications of the recovered material are limited, and the economic, energy, or environmental costs of recovering the material is high.

Also, for all the material in a jewel case, they aren’t very durable. The little plastic tabs that attach the cover to the back, or hold in the cover art, break, rendering the entire packaging worthless. I’ve broken dozens of these things and they’ve ended up in the trash.

Problem Definition

Develop CD packaging whose raw materials and production have the least amount of environmental impact and whose end product is highly recycleable or will have limited environmental impact if trashed. Ideally the packaging would either be completely biodegradeable or the materials from the packaging could be used to produce a new CD package.

The above should be accomplished while adhering to the following parameters:

  • The packaging looks nice.
  • The packaging will be displayed alongside traditional jewel-cased CDs at the record store.
  • The finished CD can be sold for $5 and less to distros (I think No Idea pays us $3.50/CD) while still recovering the expenses of the project.

Question: What is the current cost per CD of producing Defiance, Ohio CDs? What would be the cost per CD with nomal jewel case packaging?

Question: Do we want to just break even, or do we want to be able to use proceeds from the CD to fund future releases? Tour? Not working? Other projects? Benefits? How much should this be?

Solutions that Meet the Design Parameters

More Durable Plastic Case

This would be something like what’s featured in the image below.

These can be obtained from Bags Unlimited for $93.00/200 or $0.47/case. Just as an idea of relative pricing, jewel cases from Bags Unlimited cost $321.95/800 or $0.40/case. Poly bags from Bags Unlimited cost $99.60/1000 or $0.10/bag. Just for an idea of printing costs, 1 color offset for a CD cover-sized paper sheet at Stumptown Printers (who use 100% PCW papers and an environmentally friendly process) will cost $310/1000 or $0.31/cover. Bulk CDs from CDMAN cost $685.00/1000 or $0.69/CD. Bulk CDs from CDMAN cost $520/1000 or $0.52/CD. So, the total cost would be about ($0.47 + $0.31 + $0.52 = $1.30/CD.

Pros

  • More durable than jewel cases. The plastic is softer, so if you step on it, it will bend rather than break. There aren’t any stupid tabs or connectors to break off, so hopefully it will avoid the landfill.

Cons

  • It’s still plastic if it ends up in the landfill.
  • Have to have artwork printed seperately. This increases the cost.
  • Have to have CDs printed seperately. This increases the cost.

Digipack

From CDMan, with the CD included, these cost $1749/1000 or $1.75/CD. Bellweather doesn’t have a digipack package, so it would be the cost of the CDs ($0.52 * 1000 = $520/1000) plus the digipacks ($1096/1000) = $1616/1000 or $1.62/CD.
Pros

  • Probably the cheapest of the non-cd options.
  • Can get an all-in-one package so we don’t have to coordinate seperate printers, cd pressers

Cons

  • Still contains a plastic tray.

Cardboard Sleeve

This would be something similar to the image below, though they wouldn’t have the little closue tag for mailing, and would have a spine between the panels so the finished packaging would be about the same size as a jewel-case.

Just as an indicator of price, 1 color offset at Stumptown costs $830/1000 or $0.83/CD. 2 color offset, which would let us do a design like the Defiance, Ohio/1R split 7″ would cost $975/1000 or $0.98/CD. Bulk CDs from Bellweather cost $520/1000 or $0.52/CD. So, the the total cost would be $1350/1000 or $1.35/CD for 1 color offset printing or $1495/1000 or $1.50/CD for 2 color offset printing.

Pros

  • No plastic. If you used that unbleached chiboard stock (which I think looks really good), and maybe even if you didn’t, you could use this to mulch your windowbox.

Cons

  • Have to get CDs made seperately, this increases the cost.

Solutions that Cheat

Sub-run of Hand Made CDs or CDs using recycled jewel cases

Ryan already talked about wanting to make a couple hundred hand-made cds with really nice artwork to give away to friends. We could make CDs in jewel cases and maybe have an extra 200 inserts and CDs printed and use recycled jewel cases (a conversation with Tim seemed to indicate that getting old, but unbroken jewel cases in the volume of a few hundred wouldn’t be a problem). Or make 200 4-fold cardboard covers out of recycled cardboard with screen-printed covers. Then we would have the jewel-case CDs to send to distros, have readily available for tour shows, and have time to leisurely manufacture our own DIY packaging in smaller volumes.

Pros

  • Sends a really pragmatic message – that there are different ways of doing things, some of which might be better, but aren’t viable yet. Maybe they’ll be viable some day, or maybe you have an idea of how to make it viable.

Cons

  • Time consuming to produce. Would need a multi-band member commitment to work on the project.
  • Could be viewed as limited-edition collectable which is stupid.

CD as a Benefit

Since jewel case CDs are cheap, allocate a fixed amount or percentage of the proceeds from CD sales to go to a good cause. Restitution for making something that has a negative environmental impact.

Pros

  • Restitution for making something that has a negative environmental impact.

Cons

  • Are environmental costs worth it? Should we try to set an example to encourage others to consider new packaging options?

Jewel Case Recycling

If the only economically feasible packaging option is the jewel case, I would like to at least provide information to the CD buyer about how the recycle the jewel case (and maybe even the CD). This goes along with the idea, discussed in Cradle to Cradle, of producers of products taking responsibility for the environmental impact of products throughout the product’s entire life cycle.

A Google search on the web produced a page about jewel case recycling at the University of Illinois at Chicago. It gave the contact information of a company that recycles jewel cases in Indiana!

Alternative Plastic Services
c/o DADC Recycling Program
200 Brown st.
Lawrenceburg, IN 47027
contact: Joe Parks (812) 462-8323

Resources

Some universities might have environmental design classes that would take this on as a class project. Since they would be working just on this problem and have more knowledge and access to information they might be able to consider options and sources of materials that we don’t know anything about.

CD Recycling

I did some googling and found this poster at http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/osw/students/finalposter.pdf. It’s geared towards kids, but it did have some iteresting information.

This page has some information on recycling CDs. Click on “How do I recycle CD-Roms”.

It seems like vinyl LPs are much more recoverable than CDs. It seems like you could recover almost the entire record (minus the label part) and put it back in to the production process.

I wrote this e-mail to United to get more information on this:

I don’t know a whole lot about the record making process, but I know that you can get records pressed on “scrap” vinyl from other pressings. Would it then be possible to use the vinyl from old LPs (presumably first removing the part with the label) to make new LPs? If this is possible, does United have any plans to ever accept used vinyl for reuse in record pressing? If United doesn’t, do any pressing plants have plans for record re-use?