When is a lunchbox not a lunchbox? When it’s a bento box!

Time-starved adults usually ask themselves this question at the end of their work day: What’s for dinner? Well, this still holds true, but with the new school year quickly approaching we also find ourselves asking that other important question: What’s for lunch that my kids will actually eat and, possibly, enjoy?

The answer, my friends, is quite simple. Make the ubiquitous lunch box do half the work for you. I suggest that you invest in a bento box lunch box. They are all the rage among the school-age crowd. My teenagers love them and so do my elementary school nieces and nephews.

What is a bento box? A bento box is a single-portion “takeout” meal from home that is common in Japanese cuisine. A bento can have one compartment or several compartments. Other cultures have their own version of the bento, the most well known being the Indian tiffin. Kids love the commonly available bento box lunch box with several removable inner containers that allows for a complete meal.

There are several companies that offer different styles of bento boxes. One of my favorites is Laptop Lunches. They offer a great BPA-free plastic bento and their website has all sorts of great ideas for packing healthy, delicious lunches that won’t bore your kids to tears. This helps when the creative juices are at a standstill and you don’t want to resort to the school lunch program.

My kids like packing last night’s leftovers along with some fresh-cut fruit and veggies. There is even a tiny container for salad dressing or dipping sauce. The bento is a great way to get your kids involved in and excited about packing their own school lunch. With the bento you no longer have to worry about what’s for lunch. You can now refocus your energies on the age-old question: What’s for dinner?

[Photo credit: Amanda Quintana-Bowles]

Sourcing local is a challenge, and selling it is no picnic either. So hats off to Fresh & Easy’s ambitious “Farm to Store in 24” program, which guarantees local produce will be on shelves less than a day after it leaves the farm. The Tesco-owned supermarket chain, which operates 150 stores out west, says the program has been a resounding success — so successful, in fact, that they’re going to expand it.

As much as 65% of Fresh & Easy’s seasonal produce comes from California farms, and that percentage is set to increase as the retailer takes on more growers. This isn’t as simple as going out and shaking hands with a few farmers and telling them the truck will be by next week, however. It’s a collaborative effort, full of the eventualities that come with seasonal growing. Both parties have to do their fair share towards meeting that tight deadline.

“Getting produce from the farm to the store in 24 hours or less is an incredibly tricky task, which makes it important to partner with strong local growers who share our commitment to quality produce,” said Justin Hill, Fresh & Easy’s produce manager, in a statement.

The end result is worth all the effort. This summer’s lineup includes table grapes from the Coachella Valley and strawberries from farmers in Ventura County and Watsonville, on land overlooking the Pacific Ocean. MORE…

Could we be living in the dawn of a compostable age? From the look of things so far this year, it seems so. We’ve seen compostable potato chip bags from a major manufacturer, compostable coffee cups, meat trays, produce bags and more. Even the largest retailer in the world is composting these days.

So why now? Well, after years and years of not being quite good enough, the technology to make solid, cost-efficient compostable packaging has arrived. And driving that technology is increasing consumer consciousness about the massive amount of waste we produce. Can you blame them? They don’t want this world to end up like the one depicted in Wall-E — a depopulated wasteland filled with skyscraper-high piles of trash.

Companies that aren’t assessing their packaging right now should beware. It’s their embracing of “green” marketing and sustainability that has led many consumers to look more closely at every aspect of what they’re buying. Any backlash manufacturers and retailers feel would be a somewhat self-inflicted.

And yet, there are questions about compostable and biodegradable packaging. Do consumers actually do it? Do they know it doesn’t mean simply throwing something in the trash and letting it magically melt away? Composting is not a very glamorous process. It involves soil and worms, and usually attracts unwanted company. My parents’ compost pile in Kentucky gets everything from raccoons to deer, who sidle up to the tall wooden box like it’s a drive-thru window. MORE…

New stats are showing that fast beat out casual when it came to the performance of the fast casual dining segment last year. Figures compiled by Technomic indicate that fast casual is tops among the big restaurant sectors.

The Chicago-based foodservice industry consultant determined that 2009 sales for the top 100 fast-casual chains in the United States reached $17.5 billion, a 4.5% increase over the prior year; units grew by 4.3% to 14,777 locations. The performance is impressive given the tail-end effects of the recession on dining out, but entirely understandable, since the growth is based on a trade-down from table service restaurants.

In other words, the desire to eat out didn’t diminish, only the destination changed.

What is “fast casual”? Think Panera Bread — which Technomic says remained the leader of the fast casual pack, with 2009 sales of nearly $2.8 billion, up 7.1% from the prior year. Unit also grew (4.3%) to 1,304 stores. Chipotle Mexican Grill came in second, with sales growth of 13.9% to $1.5 billion, and unit growth of 14.2%, to 955 locations.

Many of these restaurants have a health and wellness or sustainability component to them, but there’s new competition all the time, and one of the newbies will be pretty hard to beat. A chain called Otarian is making a name for itself (two stores are open in New York’s Manhattan and two are planned for London) by building its entire operation and menu around carbon reduction.

Otarian is “the first ever low-carbon restaurant chain, using a cradle-to-grave analysis in the carbon footprinting of every menu item,” states the website. Indeed, each menu item (including containers and packaging) has been analyzed for carbon content, with an eye on using ingredients and processes that creates minimal carbon emissions.

So, the Tex Mex burger (spicy vegetarian patty, barbeque sauce, guacamole, salsa, cheese and lettuce on a white or brown bun) creates 1.72 kilograms of carbon, compared to 2.55 kilograms for a comparable meat-based product — a savings of nearly one kg.

Technomic’s 2010 Top 100 Fast-Casual Chain Restaurant Report notes that, besides burgers (up 16.7%), the fastest-growing menu categories reflect our desire for international flavors: Asian/noodle (up 6.4%) and Mexican (up 6.3%). It seems that Otarian — with its global conservation goals, pan-Atlantic locations and sustainable menu items — might be onto something.

(Photo credit: Otarian/Oswal Projects)

MOM’s Organic Market is a retailer on a mission. It has rigorous nutrition standards for all of its products, including no high fructose corn syrup, preservatives or artificial flavors. In 2005, it became one of the first supermarkets in the country to eliminate plastic bags, and last year it did the same with imported bottled water.

And it has a president, Scott Nash, who says things like this:

“Societies are truly addicted to plastic, much in the way we are addicted to oil.”

This level of dedication is rare in the retail industry, and it has brought MOM’s a great deal of success through die-hard customer loyalty. It’s also made the company one of the few that sets the curve for industry health and wellness.

It should come as no surprise, then, that MOM’s has a new mission — one that’s a pretty big leap, even by its own high standards:

Eliminate plastic from its stores.

Or at least comes as close as possible. As Nash’s quote conveys, MOM’s doesn’t feel it’s being a truly sustainable retailer by letting all those bags and containers make their way into garbage dumps and ocean gyres. The company already has an extensive recycling program, shows a preference for biodegradable packaging and pressures its manufacturers to use less plastic. This week, MOM’s announced it will go even further, eliminating all bottled water, bagged vegetables, and petroleum-based wax paper from shelves. It’ll offer biodegradable bags and paper instead, and allow customers to use their own bags for bulk purchases. To fill that need for healthy, portable hydration, MOM’s will have water filtration machines in stores. MORE…

Packaging matters. If the explosion in reusable grocery totes hasn’t convinced you of that, maybe this research will. According to our own MamboTrack Quick Poll, taken just last month, four in 10 (40%) consumers recently tried a new brand or switched products, specifically because it had more earth-friendly packaging.

This issue is trending right now in a very public way, thanks to a media blitz for SunChips new compostable chip bag. The bag is made from plants and will reportedly break down in 14 weeks in an active compost pile.

But it’s not just compostable and/or biodegradable packaging that’s winning consumer affection. They also prefer packaging that can be recycled or is made from recyclable materials.

That’s an issue Whole Foods Market has taken to heart with the Gimme 5 recycling program. It’s for #5 plastics like those typically found in yogurt, cottage cheese, and other tub-style containers. Most communities don’t collect those plastics for recycling. MORE…

Last summer was a good one for grilling. Encouraged by poor attendance at steakhouses and other high-end restaurants, supermarkets ramped up their selection of premium quality meats at affordable prices. Some of the stories included USDA prime cuts selling for $8.99/lb. at Costco, and Wagyu beef, which normally goes for around $40/lb., selling for $14.99 at Seattle’s Metropolitan Market.

Madness! Delicious, delicious madness. As much as shoppers would like this trend to last, the reality is that it won’t. Feed costs are up, the economy is rebounding, and health and environmental concerns are transforming the meat case into the latest battleground of ideals.

What are some of these concerns? The use — some would say overuse — of sub-therapeutic antibiotics on livestock, for starters, has become a hotly contested issue. According to research out of West Texas A&M University, one-third of consumers believe that eating meat from animals treated this way will make them resistant to antibiotics. There’s also the issue of humane treatment, with 57% of consumers who believe mistreatment is widespread in the industry, according to the same study.

And then there are those who are cutting out meat entirely — or for one day, at least. Meatless Mondays, a grassroots effort that asks people to skip meat one day out of the week, is expanding across schools and households. It addresses the concerns that many people have over meat’s — especially red meat’s — saturated fat content, as well as the environmental impact of livestock processing.

All of this adds up to create some major red flags for the meat industry. But they’re not just watching all of this happen; they’re using their marketing muscle to play up the healthy side of the market MORE…

Plastic has slowly, but steadily been gaining acceptance as a wine vessel as more people understand that plastic — PET bottles, screw caps and corks, and bag-in-box containers — can be better for the environment. And when it comes to the discerning palette of a wine drinker, and their strong affinity for lush orchards and fields of grape arbors, the environment is an important element of the business.

The statistics I read vary, but all the numbers point to reduced costs in both manufacturing and transportation (which lessens the impact on the environment). On average, wine makers can lower shipping costs up to 33% less by using plastic; conversely, they can load about 67% more wine on a truck.

“Lighter bottles mean less fuel used in the shipping process,” reads a post on Mother Nature Network. “This is where the environmental benefits come in. The plastic bottles weigh 1/8th as much as glass bottles, which usually weigh about 14 ounces. Less fuel used to ship these lighter bottles means a smaller carbon footprint during the shipping process.” MORE…

Supermarkets have shown they’re keen on using renewable materials to make and remake their stores. That’s a great step, but for many companies this is still a new frontier, and so it doesn’t hurt to look abroad for inspiration.

In this case, we’re talking way abroad — out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, somewhere near the Line Islands that sit halfway between California and Australia. That’s where Plastiki, a boat made from 12,500 recycled plastic bottles, is currently plying the waves.

If it sounds like the eco version of the movie “Up”, well, that’s because it is. Inspired by Kon-Tiki, the primitive boat that carried Thor Heyerdahl across the Pacific Ocean in 1947, Plastiki is on one of the longest eco missions in history. It set out from San Francisco in March, with hopes of reaching Sydney Harbor by July. That timeline may be a stretch, as the crew conceded in an interview with The New York Times (revelation: it’s a slow boat), but that doesn’t tarnish the overall goal of raising awareness about recycling, the need for sustainable energy, and all the stuff we throw away — much of which, in fact, can be found in the Eastern Garbage Patch, a watery landfill twice the size of Texas that Plastiki navigated through.

Determined to go against the spirit of waste that created “the gyre”, Plastiki is a marvel of renewable engineering. MORE…

Back in 2008, Greenpeace came out with its first sustainable seafood scorecard for mainstream supermarkets. Twenty companies were rated. All of them failed.

That seemed like a pretty harsh judgment at the time, but it definitely sent a message. In the proceeding two years, retailers have retooled their sourcing guidelines to rule out certain red-listed species, and to offer more options that are harvested with the health of underwater dwellers and their habitats in mind.

Greenpeace’s latest scorecard, released today, reflects these changes. Out of the same twenty that were rated, ten earned a passing score. They include Trader Joe’s, which recently ended its holdout by agreeing to source all of its seafood sustainably by 2012. Others include Wal-Mart, Safeway, Whole Foods (of course), Wegmans (of course), and taking the top spot, Target.

Target, if you’ll recall, announced earlier this year that it would stop sourcing farmed salmon, opting instead for the wild-caught Alaskan variety. That move was a first for a major supermarket retailer, and it definitely put them in Greenpeace’s good graces.

Just about every supermarket on the list has made improvements over the past two years. That shows just how important ethical sourcing is to consumers — and to retailers’ bottom lines as well, since you’re not going to turn much profit if a popular species is extinct.

Here’s hoping retailers continue to improve their sourcing. Hopefully we’ll see a couple “good” scores on next year’s report card.