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Natural or plastic? Each holiday season, consumers have to make this difficult decision when buying a Christmas tree. This debate may have now been resolved once and for all. A Hong Kong-based company has made the choice easier by producing cheaper and more eco-friendly artificial Christmas trees.
Polygroup, which calls itself the biggest manufacturer of artificial Christmas trees in the world, has an impressive list of customers ranging from big box retailers like Walmart, Home Depot, Costco and Target, to online e-commerce giant Amazon, spread across more than 25 countries worldwide.
Artificial trees are becoming increasingly common. The US imported over 20 million artificial trees in 2022, near double the figure versus a decade ago with over 80 per cent of the trees sourced from China, according to the US Commerce Department. At the same time, the demand for natural trees has fallen over the years, according to the US Department of Agriculture, which noted that in 2017 only 15 million trees were felled, down from 20 million in 2002.
According to the non-profit Carbon Trust, a two-meter-tall artificial tree, usually made from petroleum-based plastic materials and metals, can produce about 40 kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalent, more than 10 times that of a similar-sized natural tree.
Hong Kong’s Christmas tree demand has withered. What’s the root cause?
Hong Kong’s Christmas tree demand has withered. What’s the root cause?
However, buying an artificial tree can be a more environment-conscious decision if the trees are made of eco-friendly materials and used for at least five years, according to a 2018 study by the ACTA.
“We do understand in today’s world, there are some concerns about how plastics, especially the plastic we use, are impacting our environment, and we very much have the same concerns as well,” said Cheng.
The company currently has three factories in mainland China, one in Mexico and one in Indonesia that is due to start operations next week. Benefiting from its vertically integrated supply chain, which produces everything that goes into the making of an artificial tree, the company is in talks with landfill and coastline waste collection companies in China and hopes to start trials for producing trees from recycled plastic.
Polygroup also installed solar panels at all its factories in China in early 2022 to achieve 100 per cent renewable power usage during its daily operation, avoiding around 9 million kWh of fossil-based power consumption per year.
Polygroup has also partnered with US-based recycling business TerraCycle to recycle inflatable toys or pools discarded by consumers after the summer season.
“One day, I want to be able to tell our consumers that this tree is made using 100 per cent post-consumer recycled (PCR) plastics, and all the energy used to make this tree comes from the sun, from natural and replenishable energy sources,” said Cheng.
He expects the company to start manufacturing Christmas trees made from PCR plastics in the next two or three years.
“We understand a lot of consumers prefer natural trees. Whether it’s a family tradition or the smell of natural trees, it’s something that we have so far not yet been able to mimic or replicate,” he said.
The company, which just received the 2023 DHL-SCMP Hong Kong Business Award in recognition for its role in expanding its brand globally, expects the growth of artificial trees to be sustained to bridge the supply gap when natural trees are in short supply.
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