What's More Eco-Friendly: Paper or Plastic Promotional Products?

What's more sustainable: paper or plastic?

Trying to choose the most sustainable option for anything nowadays can make your head spin. With promotional products, it’s no different.

At On The Ball Promotions, we do have one easy way to differentiate sustainable products from not-so-sustainable products. Just ask yourself this question: is it paper or plastic?

Do you know which one is typically the more eco-friendly option?

Paper is more sustainable than plastic because paper can be recycled 5-7 times (plastic can usually be recycled just once), uses fewer resources to manufacture, and is biodegradable.

So what makes paper the more sustainable option when it comes to promotional products?

Paper uses less oil.

While plastic is not made from crude oil, it is manufactured from petroleum products. In 2010, 191 million barrels of liquid petroleum gases and natural gas liquids were used to make plastic products.

On the other hand, paper has no crude oil or petroleum products in it. True, some oil is used in equipment and transportation, but overall, much less oil is used to manufacture paper than is used to make plastic products.

And let’s not forget about the inks.

We work with our printer to ensure our products are made with soy- or vegetable inks, rather than petroleum-based inks. This means little oil is used in the production of our inks. It also means that the printing inks are low-VOC.

Paper is easier to recycle.

Bales of paper stacked outside at a recycling plant — Paper recycling plant.

The paper products we offer can always be recycled, whether they were printed or foil stamped. The neat thing about paper is that is can be recycled over and over again (between 5-7 times).

Low-VOC inks also make it easier to recycle paper, as they come off the paper easier in the recycling process.

Plastic, however, has a very limited lifespan. Some plastics can only be recycled one time, others 4 or 5 times.

Despite that, most plastic doesn’t even make it to recycling facilities; an estimated 8.8% is recycled. The rest goes to the landfill, where it can take 450 years to decompose. During those 450 years, it breaks down into microplastics, causing pollution on both land and in the water.

Unlike plastics, the paper products we offer are completely biodegradable.

Compared to the low 8.8% of recycled plastic materials, more than 65% of all paper products were recovered for recycling in 2020. According to the American Forest & Paper Association, the U.S. has recycled more than 63% of all paper products each year for the past eight years. The organization’s goal is to exceed 70% by 2030.

Want recycled paper? That’s easy. Want recycled plastic? That’s not so easy.

Promotional products like calendars, greeting cards, and pocket folders made from recycled paper — Just a sampling of branded giveaways made from recycled paper. Shown: presentation folders, business greeting cards, and promotional calendars.

Recycled plastic can be difficult to work with, and it can be expensive. Because of this, most plastic manufacturers choose to work with virgin materials.

Recycled paper, on the other hand, is easy to manufacture, and often costs the same as paper made from virgin pulp.

When you look at the amount of paper that is recycled (65%) compared to the amount of plastic that is recycled (8.8%), it’s easy to see why recycled paper is the more budget-friendly option.

You get a lot of personalization options with paper.

Foil stamped, printed, and embossed recycled promotional products — With paper, you can print, foil stamp, or emboss. You can even combine imprint methods. Shown above are presentation folders and business Christmas cards.

While the most popular paper for printed advertising materials is our standard white paper stock, we offer more than 40 color papers and textures, including a variety of recycled papers.

If you want to add your logo to a plastic promo item, your personalization finish options are limited.

With paper, we can do a lot. We can print, foil stamp, and even emboss. Want to get fancy? We can combine those finish options (we love custom projects; talk to us for a quote).

Paper is lightweight.

On The Ball Promotions ships FedEx — What costs more to put in this delivery van—paper or plastic? And yes, we do ship FedEx.

When looking at promotional giveaway items, paper products are most often lighter in weight than plastic.

If you compare vinyl document pouches to paper document pouches, you will find that the paper pouches are lighter than document envelopes made from their plastic-based counterpart.

So what do lighter-weight promotional products mean for you? Cheaper shipping costs.

We suppose this would be a good time to remind you that orders over $300 get free ground shipping (in the continental U.S. Sorry, Alaska and Hawaii).

Nevertheless, we still pay for shipping, so lower shipping costs for us mean lower product prices for you.

We’ll call that one a win for paper.

So which option is more sustainable: paper or plastic?

When it comes to promotional products, paper will almost always be the more environmentally sustainable option. From the raw materials to the finished product and back to the recycling facility, paper wins.

Need some promo items made from paper?

We have what your business needs—calendars, greeting cards, pocket folders, table tents, and more. Call us at (800) 475-2255, send us an email, or browse our products at OnTheBallPromotions.com.