Usage & Instructions
Envee beans are bigger than your average bean, and our paper bag design creates a natural pouring funnel. This makes envee beans significantly easier than traditional polystyrene beans to fill into your beanbag, and easier to clean up in the event of a spill.
You can visit our filling page and watch our full instructional video here.
Yes, this will go a long way to restoring your beanbag to its former comfortable glory.
Should you eventually need to dispose of your fill, there will be no options other than landfill as it will be mixed with polystyrene. However, as you will be making your beanbag comfortable and useful again, adding the envee fill will likely help keep the whole amount of polystyrene out of landfill for years to come.
They tend to have less static than traditional polystyrene beans, and they flow cleanly out of our paper packaging, which makes filling your bag an overall easier task.
If you do have an unexpected spill, they are larger, easier to see and easier to clean up than tiny traditional polystyrene beans.
You can visit our filling page and watch our full instructional video here.
Envee materials
Envee beans are made from an innovative particle foam called expanded polylactic acid or EPLA. At envee, we use a specific type of 100% bio-based PLA that is produced by NatureWorks, called Ingeo. As well as many other benefits, Ingeo is 100% biobased & produces 80% fewer greenhouse gases than traditional polystyrene during production.
Envee beans are made from an innovative particle foam called expanded polylactic acid or EPLA. At envee, we use a specific type of 100% bio-based PLA that is produced by NatureWorks, called Ingeo.
PLA is made by extracting starch from plants, in this case enzymes are then added to convert the glucose to dextrose via a process called hydrolysis.
Microorganisms then ferment this dextrose into lactic acid which is then converted to lactide. Through a polymerisation process, the lactide is used to make PLA which is one of the most widely used bio-based polymers in the world today.
With a proprietary patented process, we make envee beans by foaming the 100% bio-based PLA with a green blowing agent (CO2) and steam, right here in Melbourne, Australia.
Envee beans are a long-lasting quality beanbag filling. The first and best option for any product that you no longer need, including envee beans, is to give it or sell it to someone else who can enjoy it for many more years to come.
In future, we hope to develop a marketplace so that we can facilitate second-hand envee beans to be reused over and over again.
Most forms of PLA can also be recycled or industrially composted if commercial facilities are available. As we all know, we have a lot of work to do with developing these facilities to be more widely available in Australia.
Envee beans, which are derived from PLA, are currently undergoing an evaluation process for certification to the unique Australian industrial composting standards (AS 4736–2006).
Obtaining the AS 4736–2006 industrial composting certification would guarantee that when exposed to the right set of conditions, the material will compost down safely into usable compost. Please note, this will not happen in your beanbag as the required set of conditions will never be reached!
For more information on bioplastics, we highly recommend the Australiasian Bioplastics Association. You can view their website here, and their FAQ's are a wealth of information.
In any case, to ensure that envee beans are correctly disposed of, we will take back your beans, provided they are clean and not contaminated with other materials such as polystyrene.
Please contact us if you would like to access this service.
Not usually, which is a good thing, as if they did, they would not work as a beanbag filling!
Ingeo, used to make envee beans, requires a catalyst set of conditions to compost, usually only found in industrial composting facilities. Home composts will likely not contain the right combination of conditions to start the degradation process.
No. Both products are made from starch, but starch peanuts are a completely different product with quite different properties to envee beans. For example, starch peanuts will quickly degrade if it is wet which makes it unsuitable for filling beanbags.
No! Envee beans are perfect for both indoor and outdoor beanbags. It is no problem at all if the beans get wet. Ambient conditions will not cause them to degrade.
Safety
Envee beans contain nothing harmful and are non-toxic. With proper use, they will provide long-lasting comfort and relaxation in your favourite beanbag, however we do recommend the standard safety warnings for beanbags and beanbag filling are observed:
All openings of a bean bag and bean bag cover from which you can insert or remove filling must be fitted with a child-resistant slide fastener. This is usually a zip with its tag removed, which locks into place to prevent easy opening.A bean bag must not be supplied with any tag, handle or object that can facilitate movement of the child-resistant fastener.
WARNING: Children can suffocate if bean bag filling is swallowed or inhaled. Do not let children climb inside a bean bag. A bean bag is not a safe sleeping surface for an infant under 12 months of age.
WARNING: Small lightweight beads present a severe danger to children if swallowed or inhaled. To avoid suffocation, keep away from babies, children and pets.
Envee beans are 100% bio-based and non-toxic. They contain no harmful additives and no petrochemical compounds. To expand our bio-based resin into foamed beans, we use green CO2 rather than pentane (a volatile organic compound or VOC), which is typically used to make polystyrene foam beans. Envee beans are also completely free of CFCs and HCFCs. At no time in their life cycle do envee products contain any CFCs or HCFCs.
Packaging
Envee beans are packaged in a multi-wall paper bag. These bags are incredibly robust and keep beans safe during transit. To meet courier requirements, these bags are placed in a light cardboard box now made from 100% recycled content. We use paper based tapes to close our boxes to avoid plastics.
We are continuously optimising our packaging to reduce material usage and working with our suppliers to increase the amount of recycled content used in our packaging.
We recommend reusing packaging where possible. As our packaging is paper based, it can be disposed of in your home recycle bin.
Payment
We accept MasterCard, Visa and American Express credit cards.
We also accept Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal. If you decide to use these methods, you’ll be taken to their website where you’ll be prompted to log in and process your payment. You’ll then be directed back to our merchant website once your transaction is complete.
We aim to process refunds within five business days of an item being returned to us.
Please note that your bank may take several days to process the payment back into your account, so please allow up to ten working days after posting the item back to us before getting in touch about your refund.
We’ll contact you by email to let you know when your refund has been processed.
Ordering & Delivery
Yes, of course, you can.
Just order as a guest with no obligation to create an account.
If you’d like to check your order history and have your shopping basket items and payment details saved for next time, you can sign up for an account. It’s quick and easy, just visit our registration page and follow the instructions on-screen.
There is only a short amount of time between when you place your order and when we start processing it. If you contact us straight away after ordering, via envee@envee.eco, we may be able to cancel your order before it’s processed.
Free shipping for Victoria (All), ACT, Adelaide metro, Sydney metro & Brisbane metro customers. Shipping for all other regions is calculated at the checkout once you have entered your shipping address.
Orders are typically dispatched from our warehouse in under 24 hours. Orders placed on weekends and public holidays are dispatched on the next business day.
All orders are shipped with AusPost and depending on the final destination, they
typically deliver within 1-5 business days. You will be provided with a
tracking number in the confirmation emails so that you can follow your order.
Yes. We’ll provide updates at every stage of your order, from the moment you place it, through to despatch and delivery. In your delivery confirmation emails, you’ll receive a tracking number which you can use to check the progress of your order online.
We ship to all states and territories in Australia.
For New Zealand customers, please contact our partners at EcoBeans NZ.
If you are based outside of Australia and New Zealand, and wish to purchase our beans or partner with us, please contact us.
Returns
You can absolutely return your item to us as long as it is within 7 days after receiving it, and it’s undamaged, unused and contained in its original packaging with all labels attached.
As modern beanbags and the filling required can be very large, depending on the circumstances of the return, you may be responsible for the return shipping costs. Please contact our customer service team to discuss your situation and for further information on returns and exchanges as required.
You can also refer to our full terms and conditions for more information.
In the extremely rare event that your order arrives damaged or faulty, please take photos of the product in question and email our customer service team via envee@envee.eco with the details as soon as you can.