Sustainability Should Not Spill

 There are few things more disheartening than watching your lunch hit the pavement. Especially when it is not your fault. Especially when you are hungry, short on time, and really looking forward to those roasted veggies with that perfectly spicy hot salsa with some guac and sour cream, all bursting with flavors from Chipotle.

The first time it happened, I brushed it off. Maybe the bag had a tear. Maybe it was a fluke. But when the same thing happened again—and then a third time—I could no longer convince myself this was a one-off. The pattern was clear: Chipotle’s new “sustainable” paper bags and the associated paper bowl containers were failing. And they were failing fast.

For context, I live less than a mile from my local Chipotle. A short five-minute drive. No hills. No potholes. Nothing dramatic. Yet every single time, that brown paper bag came back soggy at the bottom, stained and weakened by the heat and moisture trapped inside. And it was not just the bag—it was the paper container inside it. The box that held the burrito bowl was equally unfit for the job, especially when it came to holding hot salsa or just carrying the weight of the meal. Together, they formed a perfect storm of seepage and failure.

If it were just the bag giving way, I might still have salvaged the meal. But when the container itself starts soaking through and giving up, there is no coming back. The bag collapses, the contents spill—and suddenly, dinner becomes disappointment.

I have had this food spill in my garage. Once, on my apartment walkway. I am lucky it has not happened inside the car. But each time, the aftermath is the same: wasted food, wasted money, wasted time, and a growing sense of frustration with a brand that claims to champion sustainability. And don't even get me started on having to clean all this up, while I am absolutely starving now, and hangry!!

Now, I am someone who believes deeply in sustainable design. I just recently founded a repair enablement platform, FixTogether. I have spent time in manufacturing, where packaging goes through rigorous tests—compression, drop, humidity. If you are going to label something “sustainable,” should it not also be functional? Should it not consider the real-life journey of a takeout order—from kitchen counter to customer’s hand?

Because here is the thing: sustainability is not just a checkbox on a product label. It is a system. And when that system fails, it creates more waste than it saves. A bag that breaks and spills food is not sustainable—it is performative. A box that cannot hold its contents without leaking? That is not innovation. That is oversight.

It makes me wonder: are companies testing these “green” solutions in real-life conditions? Are they pressure-testing them not just in climate-controlled labs but in warm kitchens, humid cars, and short drives that somehow mimic a small monsoon inside a brown bag? Are they weight testing them at all?

When I worked in manufacturing, we ran packaging through every scenario we could imagine. We dropped it. We shook it. We heat-tested, weight-tested, moisture-tested. Why? Because packaging is not a formality—it is a promise. A promise that the product inside will reach you whole.

Food, arguably, carries even more sensitivity. It is personal. It is comfort. It is need. And when packaging fails—not just once but repeatedly—it is not just a bad design. It is a breach of trust.

Which brings me to the question I cannot stop thinking about:
Who is sustainability really serving here—people or marketing?

Because when sustainable packaging leads to more food being wasted, more customers left scrambling, more moments of frustration rather than ease... is it really sustainable? Or is it just a feel-good label slapped on something no one bothered to stress-test?

And perhaps more importantly:
Are these companies actually listening to customer feedback? Or have they created the illusion of listening—surveys, help chatbots, PR statements—without the will to act?

True sustainability is not just about biodegradable materials. It is about systems thinking. Collaboration. Co-designing with the user in mind. It is asking: does this work for the customer, for the environment, and for the economics of waste?

Right now, it feels like Chipotle—and perhaps others—are skipping that last mile of thoughtfulness. And that last mile, quite literally, is where the bag breaks.

I get it—change is hard. And sustainability is messy. There is no perfect solution. But perfection is not what customers are asking for. We are asking for awareness. For responsiveness. For products that consider the entire lifecycle—from the manufacturing floor to the apartment floor where someone might be picking up spilled rice and guacamole, wondering if dinner is still salvageable.

If you claim to care about the planet, then you must care about people too. Because the two are not separate. They are deeply intertwined. Real sustainability holds both in balance: the ecological and the emotional, the systems and the stories.

To any company listening: your customer is not just a data point. He/She is a person standing in his/her garage, burrito bowl spilled, hungry, tired, and feeling let down by a decision you made in the name of “green.”

And to every reader who has had a similar moment—maybe with a compostable fork that snapped mid-meal, or a compostable straw which did not last more than 2 sips of your drink, or a recycled bottle that leaked in your bag—you are not alone. You are not too picky. You are not the exception.

You are the reality check that brands need.

So let us ask the harder questions. Let us not be pacified by the word “sustainable” until it is backed by design that works. Let us speak up—kindly, clearly, persistently—until companies realize that if sustainability is going to stick, it should not spill.

Seats of Empathy

It was not the delayed flight that disappointed me most, or the irony that the snacks—an entire box of Pringles, surprisingly generous—were among the best I had seen on a U.S. domestic airline.

It was something deeper. A fracture that went unnoticed by most, but impossible for me to ignore.

I had not flown United in nearly a decade. American Airlines had earned my loyalty over the years—with preferred status, seamless rebookings, and, on international partners like Qatar, small gestures that made me feel remembered. Valued. Seen.

But this flight with United reminded me how quickly trust can unravel when a brand’s culture is not lived out by the very people who carry it forward.

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Before I even reached the airport, United’s app was refreshingly transparent: our flight would be delayed by thirty minutes due to the crew needing mandatory rest. A reasonable delay, and one I appreciated being informed about in advance. That level of proactive communication gave me hope—perhaps things had changed since my last flight with them.

But what happened at the gate revealed something else entirely.

Five minutes before boarding, a new delay was announced. The flight attendants, it turns out, were not scheduled to be picked up from their hotel until after our original departure time. A logistical oversight that puzzled me: how could an airline miss such a basic detail? Do these scheduling gaps happen often? More importantly, who holds the accountability?

I watched time stretch and uncertainty thicken. Another delay followed—this time due to weather. What began as a short delay ballooned to over two and a half hours. I would miss my meeting. My day’s purpose was gone.

And yet, what struck me most was not the operational chaos. It was what happened next.

The plane finally boarded. I noticed several empty seats in the Economy Plus section. Some passengers—perhaps hoping for a small reprieve after hours of delay—had quietly moved forward, easing themselves into those unused spots. And then, the announcement came. Not as a welcome. Not as an accommodation. But as a warning, a correction.

“If you are seated beyond Row 21, please return to your assigned seat. Upgrades to the front are available for purchase.”

It was not just an upsell. It was a warning. A subtle but sharp reminder: empathy was not part of this equation.

That moment? That was the culture speaking. Loud and clear.

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I understand business models. I understand incentives. But I also understand people.

That announcement—on the heels of a frustrating series of events—landed like a slap. It told passengers that even after we had endured delays, missed connections, and a clear breakdown in scheduling communication, we were still being asked to pay more. No empathy. No acknowledgment. Just a script. Just a quota.

The airline might argue it was policy. But what is policy without wisdom?

Had the crew instead invited passengers with the tightest connections to move forward—to offer even the smallest chance at reclaiming lost time—it would have transformed the tone of the entire experience. Even if the delay was out of their hands, the empathy would not have been.

That is the moment when culture shows itself. Not in the livery, not in the lounge, but in the quiet, consequential decisions frontline employees make under stress.

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As a strategist, I could not help but reflect.

There is a profound disconnect when your people are not aligned with your brand’s values and empowered to live them. When KPIs reward the wrong behaviors, you are not just losing revenue opportunities—you are eroding trust. Alienating loyalty. Turning passengers into skeptics.

This is not just about airlines. This is a mirror for every business leader.

Are your metrics inadvertently encouraging short-term thinking over long-term brand affinity? Are your employees equipped—and trusted—to make decisions that reflect your company’s deeper promise?

Culture is not a plaque on the wall. It is a decision made at Row 21, seat by seat.

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So here is the question I leave you with:

If your frontline employee had to choose between earning a few dollars through a policy-driven upsell or saving the trust of a customer through a moment of empathy—which would they choose?

And more importantly—what have you trained them to value?

Because sometimes, the real upgrade a customer is seeking is not a better seat. It is a better experience. A brand that remembers why people fly in the first place: to get somewhere that matters.

On time. With care. And just enough humanity to feel like we are more than just a boarding group.