Hyundai Department Store has reduced its timber usage by about 8,000 tons in the four years since introducing its ‘eco-friendly shopping bag’. That is equivalent to protecting 53,000 trees.

According to Hyundai Department Store on the 3rd, in June 2022 it became the first in the industry to introduce 100% recycled-paper shopping bags made from waste paper across its nationwide stores. Since then, it has produced a total of 32 million eco-friendly shopping bags through the end of May this year.

The eco-friendly shopping bags made of 100% recycled paper are being produced based on Hyundai Department Store’s resource-circulation system ‘Project 100’. The process collects waste paper such as parcel boxes and packaging containers generated by the department store, turns it into recycled paper, and then uses it again as shopping bags.

Over the past four years, the amount of waste paper used to make the shopping bags has reached 1,758 tons. The bags undergo no additional processing such as separate coating, making them recyclable after use.

Hyundai Department Store plans to unveil a revamped design for the eco-friendly shopping bags next year. The idea is to apply a design that reflects the department store’s brand identity while preserving the value of resource circulation.

A Hyundai Department Store official said, “Through the shopping bags, we have consistently communicated the importance of resource circulation to customers,” adding, “We will continue to expand ESG activities that customers can feel in their daily lives.”

Hyundai Department Store’s eco-friendly shopping bag won the main prize in package design at the Red Dot Design Award in 2022 and the iF Design Award in 2023. Both Red Dot and the iF Design Award are globally prestigious design awards that originated in Germany, selecting winners each year based on rigorous criteria covering not only design excellence but also idea, distinctiveness, and impact.

Meanwhile, Hyundai Department Store also operates a ‘Vinyl to Vinyl’ (Vinyl to Vinyl) program that recycles waste vinyl generated at its stores nationwide into new plastic bags. By pyrolyzing waste vinyl to make new plastic bags for reuse, this resource-circulation model is drawing attention as an alternative for securing resources stably amid recent supply instability in plastic materials caused by a surge in naphtha prices.