It’s 9:30 p.m. Snack time. A sacred fourth meal, once I pull out my handwash-only kobachi and drop in a small handful of Blue Diamond Smokehouse almonds. I’ve been consuming them for extra years than I care to confess, appreciating the combo of pure (excessive protein and fiber) almonds with a splash of addictive processing (mmm, hickory smoke taste and maltodextrin) to maintain them feeling harmful.
It’s the proper portion of the proper snack within the excellent bowl. Virtually.
The issue with Blue Diamond Smokehouse isn’t the product. It’s the packaging. Particularly, the Ziploc-esque “resealable” zipper stops working, like clockwork, once I’m about midway via the bag. The plastic zip itself appears to carry too strongly, in order that inevitably, there’s some extent once I open the bag, and the heat-sealed weld provides out. The zip stays zipped, however now it’s connected to just one facet of the bag. ONE SIDE!!! A bag that now gapes open, probably in shock from my very own ineptitude in opening and shutting a snack.
I do know it’s not my fault. It’s the rattling dysfunctional bag. However like dropping an inexpensive glass, I’m left with an pointless burden of guilt. Was it one thing I did, Blue Diamond?? I can change! I’ll do higher subsequent time! (I by no means do.) WHY DOES NOTHING EVER GO RIGHT IN MY LIFE????!?? WHY DO I DRIVE ALL SOURCES OF MONOUNSATURATED FATS AWAY??!??!
From there on out, I’m left with this home conundrum: Shove the almonds into one other bag (feels wasteful, and the powder is gonna persist with every thing)—or curse . . . curl the bag up one of the best I can . . . and wedge it between two canned items to maintain it from springing open. Inevitably, I select the latter. However extra air will get in over the approaching weeks. The smoky almonds develop stale.
This sounds dramatic. I am being dramatic! But additionally, c’mon: 3 gallons of water go into every nut. Which means my 25-ounce pack represents 2,100 gallons of water. And Blue Diamond can’t even take the time to make it possible for a lot funding isn’t leaking throughout my pantry.
Resealable packs suck
To be truthful, Blue Diamond is much from the one perpetrator relating to poorly constructed zips. For the reason that late 1980s, resealable baggage have taken over grocery store cabinets for merchandise together with nuts, pre-shredded cheese, and frozen nuggets. Into the Nineties, these applied sciences had been largely perfected to replace boxed goods with soft packaging in pyramidic forms, creating baggage with a large backside and skinny prime that stood up and stood out on the shelf.
Regardless of many years of producing improvements, resealable packs can nonetheless be stupidly laborious to chop open with out hitting the zip. Bits of meals can clog the seals. And, increasingly more, I’m noticing how one facet of the zip can inevitably fail, as with Blue Diamond, leaving the pack lower than hermetic.
However after they work, it’s one of the best UX that the American grocery store has to supply (don’t get me began on self-checkout!), inevitably serving to to maintain meals contemporary and cut back meals waste. As a lot as 40% of America’s meals is thrown away every year. And resealable packs assist cut back this quantity—all with out introducing extra packaging (taking a look at you, Ziploc!) to unravel the issue.
So contemplate this an open name for Blue Diamond, and all these making suss resealable merchandise, to rethink their packaging. We should have the know-how to really seal baggage shut . . . once more . . . and once more.
