The $1 Billion McDonald‘s Box

John Huntsman sits in his office . He's the CEO of a packaging company . Suddenly, his receptionist comes in . There are gentlemen out front looking for you, she says . They refuse to give their names , and one of the men has his briefcase strapped to his wrist . They look like they are FBI or perhaps CIA . What could they possibly want ? The shadowy pair enters and one of the men opens the briefcase . They ask Huntsman, "Why didn't you come to us first?" These guys are not government agents . They are vice presidents of McDonald's and they want Huntsman's invention . This ingenious box, this thing is incredibly efficient . [music] It's very light . It costs just 2 cents per container . It keeps food warm. . It's easy to open and actually layer . It's easy to close. . For many years, this container will house the Big Mac . It will revolutionize fast food packaging . It will make Huntsman at McDonald's incredibly rich and it will become a cultural token . But even though it's incredibly popular to this [music] day , it was abruptly killed in an emergency meeting 36 years ago . Why ? If they're creating large volumes of waste or they're relying on hazardous chemicals , there is a cost to doing that . And the cost today is being born by regular people . McDonald's had no plans to move away from plastic environmental protest . 70% of it became litter burn . Our research starts in London