McKinsey | Sustainability in packaging: Inside the minds of US consumers

The pandemic is reshaping their views about sustainable packaging materials in ways that will force the whole value chain to act quickly.

The COVID-19 pandemic has rapidly transformed consumer behavior in several ways: sparking higher price sensitivity, accelerating online shopping across all categories, and causing shoppers to focus even more on health, wellness, and hygiene. Consumer attitudes about sustainable packaging have also changed significantly. Before the pandemic, public awareness that packaging can leak into the environment had increased a good deal. Fast-moving-consumer-goods (FMCG) companies and retailers were making big commitments to sustainable packaging, and regulatory bodies were moving decisively on the issue.