Where does all the cardboard come from?

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International Paper (the company profiled in this article) and most of the box manufacturers in the US use the software company I started, Lumi (YC W15)[0].<p>What is fascinating about these manufacturers is that many of them have been in business for more than 100 years and think on a multi-generational time scale. Managing forests and growing trees to turn them into boxes is a 25 year process.<p>There are a lot of old-timers working in these companies but I really enjoyed working with them. It&#x27;s like we were the Hobbits interacting with Ents. They make decisions in a different way, and I found that refreshing. As a fast-moving startup it forced us to be aligned with their long term view of the world.<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.lumi.com&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.lumi.com&#x2F;</a>

I was pleasantly surprised to see the 90%+ recycle rates for cardboard, which was much higher than other materials including aluminum cans (~50%). Of course, it would be better to re-use cardboard but the nature of the material and the way people and businesses use boxes makes it difficult in most cases.<p>For my own business, we almost never need to purchase boxes for outbound shipping because we can re-use boxes from our main supplier and inbound packages from Amazon and other sources.<p>Regardless, we have to recycle 75% of boxes that come into the office because we don&#x27;t have enough outbound shipping that matches the box size.

My grandfather was a corrugated cardboard box salesman for Container Corp of America back in the day. A lot of the cardboard then was coming from trees in northern Maine. All that paper industry is pretty much gone now. Not because there aren&#x27;t any trees left, but because it&#x27;s cheaper to harvest and process wood in other places now

They mentioned bamboo, and I&#x27;m surprised nobody has done this, but you could build a machine to weave extremely sturdy and reusable boxes out of bamboo fiber. They would of course be more expensive, heavier, and bulkier, but they would pay for themselves may times over in time. Reusing them could be as simple as a return center or pick-up service. As padding, you could stuff the empty space in the box with shredded bamboo. They&#x27;d be weather-resistant, tough, flexible, and stronger than steel. And growing more stock takes a fraction of the time and cost compared to trees.

My dad worked for Mead Containers for many years. If he was reading this he would complain because technically &#x27;cardboard&#x27; as everyone calls it is really &#x27;corrugated&#x27;. The corrugated board is made from multiple layers of &#x27;cardboard&#x27;.

Yes, all pine foresters can afford to silviculturally thin their forest estates, on time, so they produce larger, more valuable sawlogs in the future.<p>The pulplog and residues go into making cardboard to protect valuable products in their journey to customers, reducing damage and waste.<p>And as a bonus, it reduces the mega fire risk of the forests.<p>A win for forests and animals, a win for the customer, a win for employees, a win for investors, thank you Mr Pratt.

I wish we could simply return cardboard boxes to e.g. amazon (who drives every neighborhood daily)<p>and check a box “I prefer recycled boxes” to signal that you don’t mind using a second hand box for your delivery.

I&#x27;ve always wondered if, for example, Amazon, could be using reusable totes instead of cardboard. I get that they&#x27;d have to transport them back and they have weight, but they deliver regularly enough to my house that it seems doable now - maybe just for monthly things like subscribe and save.

Has anyone tried Audm (the company that narrates such articles)? Their product seems great for articles like these. However I don&#x27;t see yet why one would pay for a service such as this over countless free high-quality podcasts.

Long term, when fossil fuels are done, things like cardboard will be viewed as valuable resources of reduced carbon, for conversion to things that are currently petrochemicals. Plastic feedstocks, jet fuel, other chemicals.

This article makes it sound like cardboard is never made from recycled material. Even hearing that 91% of cardboard gets recycled after, it was a bit shocking to me. Does anyone know more about why this is the case?