Today, as the sustainability factor has come to the forefront, packaging seems to be as important as product itself that’s why global companies and local businesses spend much time and money on developing new solutions to make wrapping materials and containers ‘greener.’ There’s no need to explain why packaging, green by its nature (made of traditional materials like glass and paper) is much better to environment than those made of plastic and foam. According to the report released by Owens-Illinois (O-I), the world’s largest glass container maker for major brands like Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Heinz, MillerCoors and S. Pellegrino, people in the U.S. prefer to buy grocery in glass containers, the most natural, safe and good to nature since it’s 100% recyclable and helps preserve the original taste of products.

The survey, conducted by Omnibus among 1,000 respondents in the U.S. in early April, 2011, reveals that people in the U.S. prefer to buy their food in beverage in glass containers—the respondents were asked to choose from plastic, metal, paper cartons, flexible pouches and glass to name their most favourite material for food and beverage packaging.

Here are a few highlights from the survey (the full report is below):

—90% say they agree that glass is the healthiest packaging because it doesn’t leach into the product;
—85% say food and beverages taste better in glass;
—69% state that they would choose glass if they could choose to buy their favorite foods or beverages in any type of container;
—59% think that glass containers are the most natural and healthy of them (17% and 13% respondents named paper cartoons and plastic correspondingly).

Today, leaders in consumer goods and food sectors are working hard developing new approaches to packaging, introducing new biodegradable plant-based materials that cause much less herm to nature (Coca-Cola and PepsiCo’s bottles are the most prominent example), but according to the above stated results, glass is still the most preferable material in this respect. Knowing that, major food manufacturers tend to release their products in glass containers along with other types of packaging: remember Coca-Cola with its iconic contour bottle, Heinz, which brought its glass bottles to stores for a limited time in May, MillerCoors’ Vortex bottle as well as the improved Heineken bottle.

To help people “rediscover the virtues of glass containers,” O-I is launching a new campaign dubbed Glass Is Life, which is developed for people to switch to more healthy ‘packaging’ habits. The online destination explains the benefits of this type of containers from four points of view: health, sustainability, taste and quality. For the campaign, O-I tapped parents, environmentalists, designers, CEOs, brand managers and other thought leaders who share their opinions on why glass is better than other packaging materials.