Product Booklet · Issue 01
Bags that begin
in the soil.
And end there.
A small, considered range of plant-based compostable packaging, certified for industrial and home composting, made for the US market.
groundupbags.com
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02 / 19 · Who we are
We make one part of a system.
GroundUp Bags makes plant-based, certified compostable packaging engineered to break down inside the composting environments that actually exist in the United States today. Industrial composting facilities. Curbside organics programs. Properly managed home compost piles.
We do not sell “eco-friendly” plastic. We do not sell oxo-fragmenting additives. We sell a small, deliberate range of products, each one tested and certified to recognized standards, designed to do the job a single-use bag has to do and then return to soil.
A bag is one element of a system. The system is composting infrastructure, food-waste collection, and the people deciding to send a banana peel somewhere other than landfill. We see ourselves as serving that system, not solving plastic on our own.
90%
Biodegradation of organic carbon within 180 days under industrial composting conditions (ASTM D6400 spec).
4
Independent certifications carried across the range: BPI, ASTM D6400, OK Compost HOME, CMA field listing.
16
Product families covering home, retail, e-commerce, foodservice, and institutional use.
0
Polyethylene, PVC, or oxo-fragmenting additives in any product we ship.
03 / 19 · The range
16 families. One ending.
Each family is built for a specific job. Materials, gauge, and certifications are tuned to the environment the bag is most likely to end up in.
Vest & shopping bags
Carry
For groceries, takeout, and everything you walk home with.
E-commerce mailers
Soft-touch mailers that ship a parcel, then disappear.
Produce bags
Produce
Lightweight, breathable bags for the fruit aisle and farmers' market.
Pet waste bags
Walk
Built for daily dog walks, and the soil your dog walks on.
Apparel & retail bags
Pack
For boutique brands that want their packaging to make sense.
Resealable food storage
Seal
A zipper that opens, closes, and eventually goes back to the earth.
Caddy liners
Kitchen
The bag that turns your countertop caddy into a quiet habit.
Yard & leaf bags
Yard
For raking weekends and curbside organics pickup.
Industrial can liners
Liner
Commercial-scale liners for cafeterias, kitchens, and front-of-house bins.
Shopping bags with handles
Shop
Patch-handle compostable bags for retail counters and gift wraps.
Small-item pouches
Pouch
Compostable pouches for beauty samples, kit inserts, and small parcels.
Takeaway & delivery bags
Takeaway
For restaurants, cafés, ghost kitchens, and the last mile of delivery.
Sheets, films & wrappers
Film
Roll-format compostable film, sold by weight, for converters and packers.
Anti-static electronics bags
Guard
Dissipative compostable bags for accessories, cables, and small tech.
Agricultural mulch film
Field
Compostable mulch film for growers ready to skip the plastic peel.
Made to order
Custom
Your brand, printed on something that doesn't outlive it.
04 / 19 · Product detail
Kitchen & Yard
Caddy liners
Kitchen
The bag that turns your countertop caddy into a quiet habit.
Soft, ventilated liners for kitchen food-scrap caddies. Designed to disappear in your municipal organics stream or your backyard compost. The friendliest entry point in our range.
Yard & leaf bags
Yard
For raking weekends and curbside organics pickup.
Large-format compostable yard bags built to meet US municipal organics-collection standards. Wet-strength enough for damp leaves and lawn clippings; certified for direct curbside pickup in BPI-accepting programs.
05 / 19 · Product detail
Carry & Shop
Vest & shopping bags
Carry
For groceries, takeout, and everything you walk home with.
Vest-style carrier bags engineered for the weight and reach of a real shopping run. A plant-starch and PBAT compound makes them breathable enough to keep produce fresh, and strong enough for a full cart.
Shopping bags with handles
Shop
Patch-handle compostable bags for retail counters and gift wraps.
Sturdy, square-bottomed compostable shopping bags with die-cut or patch handles. Built for apparel boutiques, gift shops, and department-store retail where the bag is part of the unboxing. Reinforced for the weight of a real purchase.
06 / 19 · Product detail
Mail & Pouch
E-commerce mailers
Soft-touch mailers that ship a parcel, then disappear.
Tear-resistant compostable mailers with a self-seal closure and a second peel strip for returns. Made for online brands replacing single-use poly mailers without compromising on protection.
Small-item pouches
Pouch
Compostable pouches for beauty samples, kit inserts, and small parcels.
Small, sleek compostable pouches for sample products, kit inserts, and the kind of small-item packaging that usually arrives in single-use plastic. Heat-sealable on three sides, available in transparent or frosted finish, sized to fit the contents and not the trash.
07 / 19 · Product detail
Pack & Produce
Apparel & retail bags
Pack
For boutique brands that want their packaging to make sense.
Frosted or fully clear compostable bags for apparel, accessories, and small goods. Pair with a kraft swing tag for an end-to-end zero-plastic unboxing.
Produce bags
Produce
Lightweight, breathable bags for the fruit aisle and farmers' market.
Ultra-thin, micro-perforated bags engineered to let produce breathe and keep moisture moving. The everyday alternative to thin-film produce bags, with the same touch and the same speed at the checkout, certified to go straight into your home compost.
08 / 19 · Product detail
Walk & Seal
Pet waste bags
Walk
Built for daily dog walks, and the soil your dog walks on.
Tear-resistant compostable bags for picking up after dogs. Sized to fit standard dispensers and roll cores. Leak-proof, opaque, with a knot-friendly thickness. The good-citizen bag, made of plants.
Resealable food storage
Seal
A zipper that opens, closes, and eventually goes back to the earth.
Resealable food-storage pouches for snacks, dry goods, and lunchboxes. FDA-compliant for food contact and made from a plant-derived film. The first true alternative to a zip-top sandwich bag.
09 / 19 · Product detail
Liner & Takeaway
Industrial can liners
Liner
Commercial-scale liners for cafeterias, kitchens, and front-of-house bins.
Heavy-duty compostable can liners for foodservice, hospitality, and institutional kitchens running organics programs. Built for the demands of a full-service shift, and certified for BPI-accepted municipal composting.
Takeaway & delivery bags
Takeaway
For restaurants, cafés, ghost kitchens, and the last mile of delivery.
Heat- and grease-resistant compostable bags engineered for hot food transport. Reinforced base, sturdy handles, and a grease-barrier inner layer for delivery and dine-out service. Pairs naturally with our Kitchen caddy liners and Liner can liners for foodservice operators running organics programs.
10 / 19 · Product detail
Film & Guard
Sheets, films & wrappers
Film
Roll-format compostable film, sold by weight, for converters and packers.
Industrial-grade compostable film supplied in roll or cut-sheet format, heat-sealable, optimized for B2B converters, food packagers, and institutional kitchens. The ingredient version of what we make. Bring it into your own production line, finish it your way.
Anti-static electronics bags
Guard
Dissipative compostable bags for accessories, cables, and small tech.
Compostable bags with a carbon-loaded anti-static formulation for shipping cables, accessories, and small consumer electronics. A meaningful upgrade from black polyethylene anti-static bags. Anti-static (dissipative) only, not a full ESD-shielding metallized bag, and not intended for unprotected bare-die or moisture-sensitive semiconductors.
11 / 19 · Product detail
Field & Custom
Agricultural mulch film
Field
Compostable mulch film for growers ready to skip the plastic peel.
Roll-format compostable mulch film for row crops, market gardens, and specialty farms. Lays down like conventional poly mulch and tills into the soil at season's end. Positioned for conventional and transitioning farms; USDA NOP has not yet approved biodegradable mulch for certified-organic systems.
Made to order
Custom
Your brand, printed on something that doesn't outlive it.
Custom dimensions, custom prints, custom finishes. Two-color flexo printing using water-based, compostable inks. Lead times typically 6–8 weeks from artwork sign-off.
12 / 19 · Customization
Make it yours, without making it complicated.
Every product in the range can be sized, printed, and finished to your specification, within the constraints any compostable polymer film imposes.
Dimensions
Custom widths, lengths, and gussets within standard reel widths up to 60 in.
1–4 color flexo, water-based, compostable-certified inks. Spot colors matched to Pantone within film tolerance.
Gauge
Standard 1.0–2.5 mil. Heavy gauge to 4.0 mil for can liners and yard bags.
Finish
Translucent, frosted, or opaque. Matte and soft-touch finishes available on request.
Closures
Knot, twist-tie, draw-tape, self-seal adhesive, or hot-melt seal depending on family.
Branding
Full bag print, side print, base print, or a discrete corner mark. Spec rolls available at sample stage.
Limits exist. Some pigments cannot be matched in a compostable ink stack, and some adhesive systems are incompatible with industrial composting. Our team will flag these at the quote stage, not the production stage.
13 / 19 · Lifecycle
From a field, to a bag, to soil again.
Begins in a field · Season
Plant-derived starches and PLA feedstocks sourced from agricultural crops grown on land that does not compete with food production.
Becomes a film · Days
PLA, PBAT, and thermoplastic starch compounded in proportions optimized for each product family. Extruded into film at production.
Becomes a bag · Days
Cut, sealed, optionally printed with water-based compostable inks, and packed for shipment in a recyclable carton.
Holds your day · Weeks
Used like any other bag. Stable on a shelf for at least 12 months. Begins breakdown only when exposed to active compost conditions.
Returns to soil · 60–180 days
Composted at home or in an industrial facility, the film breaks down to carbon dioxide, water, and biomass with no microplastic residue.
14 / 19 · End of life
A bag is the wrong place to fix plastic. The system is.
Our products are engineered to break down in one of three specific environments. Each one is real, each one is reachable for a meaningful number of US households and businesses, and each one is the destination we design for.
Industrial composting
≈ 58–65 °C
Managed windrows or in-vessel systems. 90% biodegradation of organic carbon within 180 days under ASTM D6400 test conditions. Disintegration typically inside 12 weeks.
Curbside organics
Growing
Municipal programs that pick up food and yard waste and send it to industrial facilities. Active in CA, OR, WA, VT, MA, and a growing list of metro areas.
Home composting
Ambient ~25 °C
Backyard piles, worm bins, and small-scale community sites. Products carrying OK Compost HOME break down here over roughly 12 months.
Why this matters. Landfills are the third-largest source of human-caused methane emissions in the United States, accounting for 17.1% of US methane in 2022 (EPA 2024). A compostable bag in a landfill does not deliver on its design. A compostable bag in a compost system does.
15 / 19 · Certifications
Four marks. Each one a third party has tested against.
Words like “eco-friendly” or “biodegradable” carry no enforceable definition in the United States. Certifications do. These are the four that determine whether a compostable bag actually performs.
BPI Certified
01
Verified by BPI
Issued by Biodegradable Products Institute
Independent US certification confirming compostability in industrial composting facilities. The mark accepted by municipal organics programs across North America.
ASTM D6400
02
Industrial compostability
Issued by ASTM International
The North American specification for plastics designed to compost in municipal and industrial facilities. This is the standard BPI certification verifies against.
OK Compost HOME
03
Home composting
Issued by TÜV Austria
Tested to break down completely in the cooler, slower conditions of a backyard compost heap, not just industrial facilities.
EN 13432
04
European compostability
Issued by European Standard
The European benchmark for compostable packaging: at least 90% disintegration in 12 weeks and 90% biodegradation in 6 months.
ASTM D6400-23 source: ASTM International. EPA 2024 Inventory of US GHG Emissions & Sinks (1990-2022), Chapter 7. OECD Global Plastics Outlook 2022.
16 / 19 · Why GroundUp
Four reasons to put us on the shortlist.
01
Certified four ways, not one.
BPI, ASTM D6400, OK Compost HOME, and CMA field listing. The certifications most municipal organics programs in the US actually require, plus home-compost certification for households without curbside pickup.
02
A blend chosen for performance, not marketing.
PLA, PBAT, and thermoplastic starch in proportions that survive a real shopping run and a real backyard pile. A 100% bio-content bag is brittle. A 100% PBAT bag has no plant content. We optimize for both.
03
Built for the US market.
US sizing (gallons, inches), formulations compatible with major North American municipal organics programs, lead times measured against US holiday cycles, MOQs sized for US D2C and regional retail.
04
Honest about what we are and aren't.
We don't sell oxo-fragmenting plastic with a green leaf on it. We don't claim landfill-safe biodegradation. We don't pretend a bag fixes plastic. We make one part of a system, and we say so.
17 / 19 · Who we work with
Built for buyers who care what the bag is made of.
Our customers fall into a handful of segments. Each one has different volume needs, different print requirements, and a different reason for caring about end-of-life. We tune the spec accordingly.
Grocery & specialty retail
Vest, produce, and yard bags compatible with curbside organics.
Restaurants & foodservice
Caddy liners, can liners, takeaway bags, and food storage.
Direct-to-consumer brands
Mailers and retail bags with custom print, sized to USPS rate breaks.
Apparel & lifestyle
Frosted and clear apparel bags for boutique and online stores.
Municipalities & haulers
Yard and can liners certified for BPI-accepting compost facilities.
Hospitality & institutions
Reinforced compostable liners for cafeterias, hotels, and offices.
18 / 19 · Working with us
How a partnership begins.
We are deliberately small, which means every new account is handled directly. Here is what a typical engagement looks like, from first conversation to first shipment.
MOQ
50,000 units
Our standard for finished bags. Rolls and films start at 500 kg. Smaller first runs are welcomed when a brief is right.
Lead time
6–8 weeks
From artwork sign-off, including custom flexo print runs.
Custom print
Up to 4 colors
Water-based, compostable inks. Two-color included on most stock items.
Sample turnaround
5–10 days
Stock samples shipped overnight if available.
Pricing band
Indicative on request
Per-unit price varies by SKU, gauge, print, and volume.
Payment terms
Net 30 typical
Volume-based deposit on first custom run.
Specifics vary by SKU, custom-print requirements, and lead-time pressure. The numbers above are starting points, not promises.
Let’s talk
When you are ready to switch,
we will be here.
A short conversation usually saves a long procurement cycle. Tell us what you ship today, in what volume, and we will tell you which family of ours replaces it and what changes (and what does not).
contact@groundupbags.com
Website
groundupbags.com
Made to be unmade
Issue 01 · 2026