4 Ways to Avoid Using Tape in Your Christmas Gifts

If you are looking for ways to avoid using tape in your Christmas present wrapping this year, these helpful ideas might be just what you are looking for. They are almost all zero waste and more eco-friendly!

Ways to Avoid Using Tape in Your Christmas Wrapping

Source: Monaghan County Council/YouTube

1. Use Glue

Using just a touch of glue is a very effective way to avoid using tape when wrapping presents. It is, of course, not the most ideal solution eco-friendly-wise, but it does eliminate the need for tape. You should buy a more natural kind of glue and use just a bit to hold your wrappings together. 

This can be a great way to avoid using tape if the only other alternative that you have is glue. It is just as effective, if not more so, and removes the need for excessive amounts of plastic.

2. Use a Piece of Ribbon or String

You could go the traditional route when trying to avoid using tape. Using a piece of ribbon or a string is a beautiful and eco-friendly way to secure wrappings.

This will give your presents a traditional and romantic look, which is much more appealing than simply using tape to secure everything. You could even use a hair ribbon to secure the wrapping if you want to make it even more useful.

Source: Waitrose & Partners/YouTube

3. Wrap in Origami Style

Wrapping presents in an origami style is a way that allows you to carefully cut and fold the paper. So that when you wrap the present, everything fits together nicely and the paper can hold itself together.

This is a hard process to explain, which is why it is best to watch a detailed video tutorial. But if you can get the hang of it, this is the best way to avoid using tape.

This is a very effective way of wrapping presents that completely removes the need for adhesive. It creates a very pretty and impressively wrapped present!

Source: Beautiful Homes/YouTube

4. Use Fabric or Clothing for Wrapping

One of the best ways to avoid using tape when wrapping presents is to use fabric or pieces of clothing. This creates a unique and cozy-looking gift. Pieces of scrap fabric are a great way of using up fabric while reducing your overall waste during the holidays.

You could also choose a pretty sweater, scarf, or shirt as a wrapping. Both fabric and clothes can be wrapped and ribboned at once, as you can easily tie the ends together to secure them.

This is a very pretty and chic way of wrapping presents, and it reduces overall waste, even removing the need for wrapping paper.

Why You Should Avoid Using Tape

If you still aren’t sold on the idea of replacing tape in your holiday presents this year, here are some facts about why you should consider it.

Every little bit of waste matters, which is why it is up to all of us to do our best and reduce that waste. To try to be as good as we can at not contributing to the waste that has already gotten so badly out of control.

It’s Plastic

If you want to create less waste this holiday season, one way to do that is to stop using tape. Tape is one wasteful item that many tend to overlook or forget about, but it is very wasteful.

We all know just how bad plastic pollution is and how we should avoid single-use plastic. Tape might not automatically come to mind, but it is a single-use plastic all the same.

This small item of plastic could very well add up and contribute to the already massive problem of plastic waste. Plastic doesn’t just go away, so it is best to limit how much you use in every way possible.

It Doesn’t Serve a Purpose

Another big issue with using plastic tape is that it doesn’t serve a purpose. Well, not really.

You may say that it does have a purpose and on a small scale, it does. But in the larger scheme of things, tape is pretty useless when you look at all of the other options that you have.

At the end of the day, tape along with wrapping paper just becomes garbage as it is discarded almost immediately. Wrapping paper is bad enough, but at least it will decompose for the most part. Plastic tape, however, will not. Not before dispersing microplastics or being ingested by a wild animal, that is.

Related Content:

• The Environmental and Social Impact of Top Holiday Gifts
• Tips for Making Your Holidays a Little More Environmentally-Friendly
• Easy Swaps to Help Make Your Holidays Waste Free!
• Australian Artist Uses Sand to Create Art and Reduce Waste
• Petition: Ban Single-Use Plastic; Microplastics Have Now Been Found in Antarctica
• Baby Bottles Release Microplastics, Per New Study

Easy Ways to Help the Planet:

• Eat Less Meat: Download Food Monster, the largest plant-based Recipe app on the App Store to help reduce your environmental footprint, save animals and get healthy. You can also buy a hard or soft copy of our favorite vegan cookbooks.
• Reduce Your Fast Fashion Footprint: Take the initiative by standing up against fast fashion Pollution and supporting sustainable and circular brands like Tiny Rescue that are raising awareness around important issues through recycled zero-waste clothing designed to be returned and remade over and over again.
• Support Independent Media: Being publicly funded gives us a greater chance to continue providing high-quality content. Please consider supporting us by donating!
• Sign a Petition: Your voice matters! Help turn petitions into victories by signing the latest list of must-sign petitions to help people, animals, and the planet.
• Stay Informed: Keep up with the latest news and essential stories involving animals, the environment, sustainable living, food, health, and human interest topics by subscribing to our newsletter!
• Do What You Can: Reduce waste, plant trees, eat local, travel responsibly, reuse stuff, say no to single-use plastics, recycle, vote wise, switch to cold water laundry, divest from fossil fuels, save water, shop wisely, Donate if you can, grow your own food, volunteer, conserve energy, compost, and don’t forget about the microplastics and microbeads lurking in common household and personal care products!