Ozone Coffee is one of the most respected speciality roasters in the UK and New Zealand, known for their long-term commitment to sustainability, community impact, and responsible sourcing. A certified B Corp since 2022 and winner of Most Sustainable Brand at the European Coffee Awards (2024), Ozone approaches every part of its business, from farming partners to packaging, with a systems-thinking approach.

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Grounded first connected with Ozone in 2021. Since then, we’ve supported the brand across several phases of their packaging evolution, helping them shift from virgin plastic to compostable films in 2022 and now into high-performance mono-material flat-bottom pouches made from 70% post-consumer recycled (PCR) content.

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The result: a packaging system that is more sustainable, reduces cost, and is better suited to the realities of their retail, wholesale, and subscription channels.

In 2022, Ozone Coffee championed compostable packaging as they transitioned away from virgin polyethylene. By 2024, they were back to the drawing board.

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The reason was simple. Most UK and New Zealand households can't access industrial composting. Bags labelled "compostable" were ending up in landfill, where the polymers break down anaerobically and produce methane, a more potent greenhouse gas than CO₂. This is the exact outcome the switch from virgin PE was meant to avoid. The barrier performance of compostable films also couldn’t reliably protect coffee aromatics across a meaningful shelf life.

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"We moved away from compostables after championing them, which wasn't comfortable, but it was the right call," says Sarushka Reddy, Head of Marketing at Ozone. "The goal is to reduce impact, not to defend a previous decision."

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The timing made the decision urgent rather than optional. Between October 2023 and November 2025, ICO Composite green coffee prices more than doubled, peaking at 354.32 US cents/lb in February, the highest monthly prices on record. Freight stayed elevated post-pandemic. UK postal rates climbed. With the cost of green coffee outside their control, Ozone needed every other line in the operation to work harder. Packaging was one of the bigger levers available.

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"When coffee prices doubled, we couldn't compromise on quality or sustainability. We had to find efficiencies everywhere else. The packaging transition wasn't just about environmental impact; it was about building a more resilient business."

— Alex Walsh Production Manager, Ozone Coffee

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What The New Packaging Had To Do

Ozone's previous system ran two separate formats across two channels: a premium flat-bottom pouch for retail and wholesale, and a lightweight stand-up pouch for ecommerce and subscriptions. With 25+ Blends and Single Origins running at any given time, that doubled the SKU count through every part of the operation: ordering, dispatch, warehousing, and forecasting.

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The brief for the new system was specific:

• A recyclable mono-material structure that works with real-world infrastructure in the UK and NZ
• Carry a high percentage of food-safe post-consumer recycled (PCR) content
• Better oxygen and moisture barrier than the compostables it replaced
• A single format that works on retail shelves and fits Royal Mail's 25mm "large letter" specification when shipped through the letterbox
• Deliver a lower per-unit cost
• Support operational consistency across both hemispheres

Grounded developed a single dual-purpose flat-bottom pouch in mono-material PCR, 70% post-consumer recycled food-safe LDPE. It's engineered to stand on a shelf with the presence Ozone's wholesale customers expect, and to flatten into Royal Mail’s Large Letter envelope (353 x 250 x 25mm, max 750g) when filled at subscription weights.

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"Previously, we just couldn't do that with the compostable material. PCR gave us a format that's letterboxable for ecom but still stands up nicely on a shelf for wholesale. It gets us a better price and streamlines the operation."

— Alex Walsh Production Manager, Ozone Coffee

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The pouch is recyclable through soft-plastic collection schemes that already operate in both markets: Tesco, Sainsbury’s, and Co-op front-of-store points in the UK, and the 290+ public drop-off locations in the New Zealand Soft Plastics Recycling Scheme. The UK government’s Simpler Recycling regulations require local authorities to collect plastic films at kerbside from 31 March 2027, extending the recycling pathway from supermarket drop-offs into home collection.

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The second piece was operational. Grounded's managed inventory model, already in place for Ozone NZ, is now rolling out in the UK. Ozone draws stock as needed and is invoiced monthly based on usage, rather than paying for full inventory upfront, which had previously tied up capital and warehouse space.

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"The finance team is excited about monthly invoicing instead of large upfront costs. It frees up capital for other parts of the business and eliminates the warehouse-space constraints we'd been managing around."

— Alex Walsh Production Manager, Ozone Coffee

*Based on an average of 100,000 pouches per year.

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Material and carbon

• 70% post-consumer recycled content, food-safe certified, produced in Sedex-certified supply chains
• 24% reduction in material per pouch, equivalent to 509 kg of material avoided per year
• 40% lower production-stage emissions
• 24% lower logistics emissions
• 75% lower end-of-life emissions
• Approximately 6,400 kg CO₂e avoided per year against the previous compostable system, verified via comparative lifecycle assessment
• Above 300 kg of packaging diverted from landfill per year through soft-plastic recycling streams

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Cost and operations

• 30 to 40% reduction in subscription postage cost. Pouches now qualify for Royal Mail Large Letter rates (from £1.55) rather than Small Parcel rates (from £3.90) at the same weight band. Zero postal-system rejections in 12 months in market
• Two formats consolidated into one, reducing SKU complexity across ordering, picking, dispatch, and forecasting
• Lower per-unit packaging cost through volume consolidation
• Reduced product wastage from improved barrier performance
• Freed up working capital through monthly drawdown invoicing rather than upfront inventory commitments

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Customer and commercial

• Letterbox-compatible delivery for the entire In My Mug subscription base
• Improved print finish has supported white-label work with premium retailers including Ottolenghi and Federal
• Transition coincided with Ozone’s B Corp recertification and contributed directly to their improved impact score

“There’s nothing worse than getting home and you’ve missed your coffee delivery because it couldn’t fit in the letterbox.”

— Alex Walsh, Production Manager, Ozone Coffee

What The Partnership Made Possible

Ozone's packaging evolution shows what happens when sustainability decisions are made against the infrastructure that exists, rather than the one that should exist. Compostables made sense on paper. PCR mono-material made sense in practice. The cost win and the carbon win came from the same decision.

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For specialty roasters managing the same green-coffee crisis, and for premium food brands more broadly, packaging is one of the few line items where a single change can do four jobs at once: cut cost, improve product, simplify operations, and reduce real-world impact.

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"Start by being honest about what your current packaging actually does in the real world, not just what it's designed to do in ideal conditions. Talk to the people who manage waste infrastructure. And don't be afraid to change your mind if better evidence comes along."

— Sarushka Reddy, Head of Marketing, Ozone Coffee

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By partnering with Grounded Packaging, Ozone Coffee’s packaging has contributed to kelp and mangrove restoration projects across Indonesia, Cambodia, Palos Verdes, and Southern California.