New Packaging Protects Golf Balls and Supports Biodiversity

This past year the Finnish golf equipment company, Golf Coat Oy, made the decision to collaborate with the innovative packaging design company, Metsa Board to create a new type of packaging for golf balls that can be converted into an insect hotel. According to Metsä Board Corporation press release, Golf Coat Oy was interested in supporting biodiversity and highlighting the benefits of the circular economy, and Metsa Board helped them do just that. 

An act of collaboration
“Our aim was to create a simple, smart and cost-effective structure that would be easy to assemble and fill with, for example, leaves, saw dust or dry grass after its primary use as a golf ball box. Metsä Board and its partners developed an insightful packaging that provides an artificial nesting structure and shelter for insects and pollinators,” Aki Kuivaniemi, CEO of Golf Coat Oy said in the press release.

As for Metsa Board,creating the new packaging was an act of creative collaboration. According to Packing Europe, the final design is the result of collaborative workshops with the company’s customers and producers. The workshops focused on improving the golf ball packaging while also creating something new. 

“The packaging is an excellent example of how teamwork can create something totally new,” Gunilla Nykopp, the customer experience manager of Metsä Board’s packaging design team, told Packing Europe. 

The golf ball packaging was first launched in February 2022, and is currently being used in Finland, Sweden, Japan, and Korea. 

Good designs win prizes
In addition, the innovative design has also been winning prizes. In June 2022, the golf ball packaging design won the public vote for best new wood product in the New Wood competition run by Uusi Puu, in which audience members vote for the best new wood-based sustainable products. 

Kuivaniemi described the positive benefits of this innovative packaging concept in the press release: “Our packaging provides a habitat that is good for nature, and also brings circular economy thinking to the game of golf, it is also good for the image of the sport as a whole,” he stated.

So in the future golfers might want to make the extra effort and consider using Golf Coat Oy balls the next time they head out to the links for a game of golf, and gain the added advantage of providing a home for insects and other pollinators as they do so.