Nombre de marques d’hygiène-beauté se sont engagées à rendre leurs emballages recyclables d’ici à 2025. Yves Rocher a choisi, depuis mars, de ne récupérer que les emballages de produits de maquillage. « La collecte s’adosse à un schéma logistique existant. Nous ne voulions pas mettre de camions supplémentaires sur les routes pour la récupérer, cela n’aurait pas de sens », insiste Virginie Horel, responsable du pôle projets d’Yves Rocher France. Quand les quantités récoltées seront suffisantes, les packagings seront valorisés par Terra­Cycle.

Terracycle avec le concours des marques Gillette (Procter & Gamble), Signal (Unilever) et du groupe L'Oréal installent des bornes pour collecter et recycler les emballages des produits de beauté dans les 140 magasins Monoprix.

En 2018 et 2019, Terrracycle, avec le concours du groupe Procter & Gamble, avait mené des campagnes pour collecter et recycler les emballages de produits de beauté chez Monoprix. En 2022, l'opération prend de l'ampleur.

Botellas, latas, papel o cristal tienen unos cauces de reciclaje firmemente establecidos que garantizan (en teoría) su reaprovechamiento. Pero no sucede lo mismo con una larga lista de enseres y objetos cotidianos cuyo reciclaje es sumamente difícil por sus características. Terracycle tiene instalados 369 puntos de recogida en todo el país para que los ciudadanos depositen sus productos para reciclar, si bien está previsto ampliar su presencia en España, según ha explicado la empresa.

El 80% de los residuos que se rechazan podría ser procesados y convertidos en material útil para hacer nuevos productos. No se hace porque es complicado y caro. TerraCycle revierte esta situación y recoge productos concretos de nuestro día a día para darles una segunda vida y que no acaben en el vertedero: bolígrafos, maquinillas de afeitar, cápsulas de café, tóneres de impresora…

Eric Rosenbaum   KEY POINTS

• Terracycle and Loop founder and CEO Tom Szaky says the economics of the recycling business are broken in key ways, but consumer and corporate interest in building a circular economy continues to grow.
• Low oil prices, bans on imported recyclables in countries like China, and the latest trends in packaging design make it harder to recycle.
• Still, the recycling CEO says getting to a low-waste or even zero-waste economy is the way the world once was and can be again.

  Recycling may make you feel better in a very small way about your role in helping to avert a global apocalypse, but even in “friendly” places, from John Oliver to NPR podcasts, recycling, especially of plastics, is being given a hard look. More people are wondering: Does it work? The debate is not new. For years the economics of plastic recycling have been questioned. But the problem is not going away. The globe is already producing two trillion tons of solid waste a year and is on pace to add more than a trillion more on an annual basis in the coming decades, according to World Bank data. A recent study found that the 20 top petrochemical companies in the world, among the group Exxon Mobil and Dow, are responsible for 55% of the world’s single-use plastic waste, and in the U.S., specifically, we are generating about 50 kilograms of throwaway plastic a year, per person. The Covid pandemic has heightened attention to the issue, as use of disposable goods went up anywhere from 30% to 50%, according to Tom Szaky, CEO of recycling companies Terracycle and Loop, who joined CNBC’s Leslie Picker on a recent CNBC Evolve Livestream about sustainability and business. He says concerns about the macroeconomics of waste management systems suffering economically are real, and there are ways to solve it that don’t just rely on government. We all need to take a deeper look at how we recycle beyond the feel-good blue bin, and what we can do to get past the problems. 1. The economics of recycling are broken. Szaky says recent reporting on the economic issues for plastics recycling and restrictions around the world on imported recyclables, which are both weighing on the sector, are not an anti-environmental attack but “absolutely rooted in facts.” He says it is important for consumers to understand that just because you recycle an item does not mean it will be recycled in the end. “What makes something be recycled in a country doesn’t have to do with what we normally think: Can it be recycled? Most of the things we put in blue bins that are not recycled are put in the garbage because they are things waste companies can’t make money off, and that is the true bottleneck,” he said. The right question is “Can a garbage company, the actual company in charge of the recycling in the geography, recycle it at a profit?” According to Szaky, what’s happened is a profitability model that is decreasing as oil prices have gone down, which started in 2015, and even after a commodities market recovery post-Covid, have stayed down relative to recent history. The petrochemicals companies that make plastics rely less on recyclables when the price of their core commodity, oil, is lower. Second, China stopped importing recyclable waste, a move followed by other countries in 2018. Both issues are critically important to the business model of recycling and the health of the infrastructure because they circle back around to how much demand there is to collect those material types. “And it all hurt the business construct for recycling companies and that means our recycling capabilities are deteriorating,” Szaky said. “Recycling is not out there trying to do the best it can but maximize profit and we need to think about that as we aim for a more circular economy,” he said. 2. A packaging industry mega trend is working against recycling The biggest global trend in packaging is not helping. Efforts to reduce costs in products and packaging are “objectively reducing value” Szaky said, “which also makes them less recyclable.” The “lightweighting” of packages, making them have less physical material and more complexity as a result of that design challenge, makes them less profitable to recycle. All of these economic issues lead to a situation in which what people would like to see is not what they would actually see if they went behind the scenes in the recycling industry. But Szaky says at the same time, consumers want to recycle more, and more companies are leaning into their own recycling. What companies decide to do about recycling on their own initiative — and pay for — can be done in spite of the challenging economics and can still pay off for the companies in the future. That’s the Terracycle business model, working with companies to fund their own voluntary recycling efforts. And that is more important at a time when the economics of consumer recycling are a mess. 3. Why companies don’t recycle enough, but should more Szaky says what’s really important right now is companies deciding to lean in and create their own recycling programs. But he says it is still not easy for the corporate mindset to embrace. “As a retailer or brand, if you just frame it as ‘the right thing to do’ the funding will be small and sporadic because there is no P&L logic to do it. But if you can use it to drive foot traffic like Walmart with car seats or Staples with pens, it can be monetizable,” he said. Brands that run their own recycling programs should be doing it as part of a plan to drive more market share and brand preference. And he says it becomes “monetizable in a recognizable way” the bigger they become and the faster they can grow. “That is true for any sustainability measure a company is looking to implement in the short term.” Some products won’t be recycled unless companies are the recycler. A dirty diaper or toothbrush or cigarette is not recyclable because it costs too much. It is another economic problem, not a physics or chemistry one. Terracycle recently launched a diaper recycling program in Holland and now it is expanding to many countries. “Diaper recycling doesn’t make sense from an economic perspective. It is expensive to collect and process,” Szaky said. But for the company that leads, “it can drive core value maybe better than TV ads,” he added. Consumers want to do the right thing, and companies may want to do the right thing as well in acknowledging an environmental crisis — and fund a feel-good marketing campaign — but Szaky stressed that they need to see “not just the right thing, but that it will pay back.” Szaky’s other business, Loop, which works with companies on circular economy production, recently teamed with a luxury watchmaker on the world’s tallest landfill: Mt. Everest. The mountain is littered with oxygen tanks from previous climbs and the watchmaker was able to both clean up the mess, an expensive undertaking, and source metal for its watches, which may add to the story it sells consumers in a way competitors can’t match. 4. The real solution is obvious: Consuming less The white elephant, the fundamental answer to the challenge, is modulating consumption downward, but Szaky says that is a hard one for the business world to champion. “It is fundamentally de-growth.” Loop, even working with companies to create products from recyclables and where the recycling is part of the product story and selling point, “is not the answer to the garbage problem,” he says. It may be among the best ways to manage waste in a circular economy, but Szaky says we will need to aim to go back to a world where garbage doesn’t exist. “Before the 1950s, we received milk from the milkman and mended clothes and cobbled shoes,” he says. Reuse does still exist at scale today in certain markets, such as beer kegs and propane tanks, but not nearly enough, and without the convenience of an infrastructure which makes return easy and widespread. That is one of the keys he sees for the future. 5. Reusable versus recyclable While the goal of zero waste is ambitious, it is realistic to imagine a world in which more consumer products become reusable, if they can be easily returned in the circular economy. Reusable versions of products from Nestle, Procter & Gamble, Kroger, Walgreens, and hundreds of other retailers are being, or will in the future, be made available to consumers. We can switch a consumer who maybe doesn’t even care about sustainability and that’s frankly the most important. We need to bring everyone along, not just people who view this as a high-passion project. Szaky envisions the buy-and-return-anywhere model as a key one for the future. “Buy your favorite shampoo bottle in a reusable form at a Walgreens in New York and drop it off at Burger King and buy an Impossible Whopper in reusable packaging too, and drop that off somewhere else.” This model can help solve a big problem: consumer behavior. Szaky says while there is a significant consumer market motivated by environmental concerns and consumption, for the recycling industry to really work it needs to avoid relying on the most-motivated consumers. Even plastic recycling that is economic today, such as soda bottles, only results in 1 in 4 bottles being recycled. The No. 1 goal for most consumers will remain convenience and value. A reusable package is an upgrade over a disposable package in an objective way, and with the convenience of drop-off locations it can lead to an easier shift in behavior, but it has to be offered at the right value to consumers. “With all three things coming together we can switch a consumer who maybe doesn’t even care about sustainability and that’s frankly the most important,” Szaky said. “We need to bring everyone along, not just people who view this as a high-passion project.” 6. Economics are busted but the recycling mindset matters For all the debate over recycling and the hard facts about its economics, Szaky says there is a reason we talk about it so much. The individual journey with sustainability always begins with recycling. And that remains key and a reason to figure out how to fix its short-term and long-term challenges. When people start recycling, it does open the pathways to a broader change in mindset. “It may lead to a plant-based diet instead of animal protein, or a smaller life, or biking ... creating even more important outcomes,” he says. “But first we have to solve the business problem.”

Eric Rosenbaum   KEY POINTS

• Terracycle and Loop founder and CEO Tom Szaky says the economics of the recycling business are broken in key ways, but consumer and corporate interest in building a circular economy continues to grow.
• Low oil prices, bans on imported recyclables in countries like China, and the latest trends in packaging design make it harder to recycle.
• Still, the recycling CEO says getting to a low-waste or even zero-waste economy is the way the world once was and can be again.

  Recycling may make you feel better in a very small way about your role in helping to avert a global apocalypse, but even in “friendly” places, from John Oliver to NPR podcasts, recycling, especially of plastics, is being given a hard look. More people are wondering: Does it work? The debate is not new. For years the economics of plastic recycling have been questioned. But the problem is not going away. The globe is already producing two trillion tons of solid waste a year and is on pace to add more than a trillion more on an annual basis in the coming decades, according to World Bank data. A recent study found that the 20 top petrochemical companies in the world, among the group Exxon Mobil and Dow, are responsible for 55% of the world’s single-use plastic waste, and in the U.S., specifically, we are generating about 50 kilograms of throwaway plastic a year, per person. The Covid pandemic has heightened attention to the issue, as use of disposable goods went up anywhere from 30% to 50%, according to Tom Szaky, CEO of recycling companies Terracycle and Loop, who joined CNBC’s Leslie Picker on a recent CNBC Evolve Livestream about sustainability and business. He says concerns about the macroeconomics of waste management systems suffering economically are real, and there are ways to solve it that don’t just rely on government. We all need to take a deeper look at how we recycle beyond the feel-good blue bin, and what we can do to get past the problems. 1. The economics of recycling are broken. Szaky says recent reporting on the economic issues for plastics recycling and restrictions around the world on imported recyclables, which are both weighing on the sector, are not an anti-environmental attack but “absolutely rooted in facts.” He says it is important for consumers to understand that just because you recycle an item does not mean it will be recycled in the end. “What makes something be recycled in a country doesn’t have to do with what we normally think: Can it be recycled? Most of the things we put in blue bins that are not recycled are put in the garbage because they are things waste companies can’t make money off, and that is the true bottleneck,” he said. The right question is “Can a garbage company, the actual company in charge of the recycling in the geography, recycle it at a profit?” According to Szaky, what’s happened is a profitability model that is decreasing as oil prices have gone down, which started in 2015, and even after a commodities market recovery post-Covid, have stayed down relative to recent history. The petrochemicals companies that make plastics rely less on recyclables when the price of their core commodity, oil, is lower. Second, China stopped importing recyclable waste, a move followed by other countries in 2018. Both issues are critically important to the business model of recycling and the health of the infrastructure because they circle back around to how much demand there is to collect those material types. “And it all hurt the business construct for recycling companies and that means our recycling capabilities are deteriorating,” Szaky said. “Recycling is not out there trying to do the best it can but maximize profit and we need to think about that as we aim for a more circular economy,” he said. 2. A packaging industry mega trend is working against recycling The biggest global trend in packaging is not helping. Efforts to reduce costs in products and packaging are “objectively reducing value” Szaky said, “which also makes them less recyclable.” The “lightweighting” of packages, making them have less physical material and more complexity as a result of that design challenge, makes them less profitable to recycle. All of these economic issues lead to a situation in which what people would like to see is not what they would actually see if they went behind the scenes in the recycling industry. But Szaky says at the same time, consumers want to recycle more, and more companies are leaning into their own recycling. What companies decide to do about recycling on their own initiative — and pay for — can be done in spite of the challenging economics and can still pay off for the companies in the future. That’s the Terracycle business model, working with companies to fund their own voluntary recycling efforts. And that is more important at a time when the economics of consumer recycling are a mess. 3. Why companies don’t recycle enough, but should more Szaky says what’s really important right now is companies deciding to lean in and create their own recycling programs. But he says it is still not easy for the corporate mindset to embrace. “As a retailer or brand, if you just frame it as ‘the right thing to do’ the funding will be small and sporadic because there is no P&L logic to do it. But if you can use it to drive foot traffic like Walmart with car seats or Staples with pens, it can be monetizable,” he said. Brands that run their own recycling programs should be doing it as part of a plan to drive more market share and brand preference. And he says it becomes “monetizable in a recognizable way” the bigger they become and the faster they can grow. “That is true for any sustainability measure a company is looking to implement in the short term.” Some products won’t be recycled unless companies are the recycler. A dirty diaper or toothbrush or cigarette is not recyclable because it costs too much. It is another economic problem, not a physics or chemistry one. Terracycle recently launched a diaper recycling program in Holland and now it is expanding to many countries. “Diaper recycling doesn’t make sense from an economic perspective. It is expensive to collect and process,” Szaky said. But for the company that leads, “it can drive core value maybe better than TV ads,” he added. Consumers want to do the right thing, and companies may want to do the right thing as well in acknowledging an environmental crisis — and fund a feel-good marketing campaign — but Szaky stressed that they need to see “not just the right thing, but that it will pay back.” Szaky’s other business, Loop, which works with companies on circular economy production, recently teamed with a luxury watchmaker on the world’s tallest landfill: Mt. Everest. The mountain is littered with oxygen tanks from previous climbs and the watchmaker was able to both clean up the mess, an expensive undertaking, and source metal for its watches, which may add to the story it sells consumers in a way competitors can’t match. 4. The real solution is obvious: Consuming less The white elephant, the fundamental answer to the challenge, is modulating consumption downward, but Szaky says that is a hard one for the business world to champion. “It is fundamentally de-growth.” Loop, even working with companies to create products from recyclables and where the recycling is part of the product story and selling point, “is not the answer to the garbage problem,” he says. It may be among the best ways to manage waste in a circular economy, but Szaky says we will need to aim to go back to a world where garbage doesn’t exist. “Before the 1950s, we received milk from the milkman and mended clothes and cobbled shoes,” he says. Reuse does still exist at scale today in certain markets, such as beer kegs and propane tanks, but not nearly enough, and without the convenience of an infrastructure which makes return easy and widespread. That is one of the keys he sees for the future. 5. Reusable versus recyclable While the goal of zero waste is ambitious, it is realistic to imagine a world in which more consumer products become reusable, if they can be easily returned in the circular economy. Reusable versions of products from Nestle, Procter & Gamble, Kroger, Walgreens, and hundreds of other retailers are being, or will in the future, be made available to consumers. We can switch a consumer who maybe doesn’t even care about sustainability and that’s frankly the most important. We need to bring everyone along, not just people who view this as a high-passion project. Szaky envisions the buy-and-return-anywhere model as a key one for the future. “Buy your favorite shampoo bottle in a reusable form at a Walgreens in New York and drop it off at Burger King and buy an Impossible Whopper in reusable packaging too, and drop that off somewhere else.” This model can help solve a big problem: consumer behavior. Szaky says while there is a significant consumer market motivated by environmental concerns and consumption, for the recycling industry to really work it needs to avoid relying on the most-motivated consumers. Even plastic recycling that is economic today, such as soda bottles, only results in 1 in 4 bottles being recycled. The No. 1 goal for most consumers will remain convenience and value. A reusable package is an upgrade over a disposable package in an objective way, and with the convenience of drop-off locations it can lead to an easier shift in behavior, but it has to be offered at the right value to consumers. “With all three things coming together we can switch a consumer who maybe doesn’t even care about sustainability and that’s frankly the most important,” Szaky said. “We need to bring everyone along, not just people who view this as a high-passion project.” 6. Economics are busted but the recycling mindset matters For all the debate over recycling and the hard facts about its economics, Szaky says there is a reason we talk about it so much. The individual journey with sustainability always begins with recycling. And that remains key and a reason to figure out how to fix its short-term and long-term challenges. When people start recycling, it does open the pathways to a broader change in mindset. “It may lead to a plant-based diet instead of animal protein, or a smaller life, or biking ... creating even more important outcomes,” he says. “But first we have to solve the business problem.”

Tom Szaky says, “Wow! " Maybe he plugs his nose like we all do, but in front of a full Pampers - just like in front of a cigarette butt, glasses of glasses thrown in the trash or fabrics with enigmatic names of fibers doomed to the dumps. - he sees the opportunity to find a solution. Born in Hungary, arrived in Toronto at the age of 5, now living in New Jersey - he studied at Princeton -, Tom Szaky is truly one of the entrepreneurs who stand out in the world by greedily embracing the challenges of the circular economy. You may know one of his babies, Loop, a company already present in the United States, France and the United Kingdom, which has just arrived in Canada and which allows brands sold in supermarkets to use containers. recorded. It's being tested in Toronto now, in partnership with Loblaw and other well-known brands, such as Heinz or Häagen-Dazs. "It's been just over a week and we've exceeded our one-month goals," Szaky said in a telephone interview. Basically: we order online, it is delivered by Loop, the customer consumes the contents - soup, ketchup, juice, etc. -, and the container is then taken back by a delivery system which will carry everything for cleaning. Then the containers will return to the brands, who will refill them, resell them. You get the picture. And it will be in Montreal at the beginning of 2022, the garbage recycling giant told me. Because there isn't just Loop in the life of the 39-year-old entrepreneur. There is also TerraCycle, his first company, dedicated to the transformation of waste. His first product, at the very beginning, in 2001, was kitchen waste, which he vermicomposted, sold in recycled plastic bottles. But today, it has gone much further in the recovery and transformation of waste long considered irrecoverable, such as dirty disposable diapers - which its teams make into plastics in particular - and cigarette butts, from which they also extract plastics from the filter, while composting the rest of the tobacco. TerraCycle also works to collect and process plastic bottles around the world. Because the company is everywhere, from Tokyo to Trenton, in Ontario, present in twenty countries. With laboratories all over the place, but mainly in New Jersey - in a landfill - TerraCycle is constantly doing research. Its business model: wait for a major player to ask for its help. The company does not seek to sell its green solutions. She finds solutions for those who want them. In large scale. Its partners are called Walgreens, Home Hardware, Procter & Gamble… The list goes on. One of the next projects: promoting waste as an information medium. The contents of diapers say a lot about the health of babies, as does used oil on the condition of engines, says Tom Szaky. You might as well take advantage of everything that can be revealed.   Another avenue explored: the Loop system of material reuse in a loop, but applied to cloth diapers and children's clothing. It's coming fast in the United States and the United Kingdom. In both cases, in partnership with very large companies. So, we forget the small community cloth diaper cleaning service. We think big brands sold in supermarkets. With cleaning, transport and reuse systems in the case of diapers. And simply a cash deposit system, such as a deposit, in the case of baby clothes. Deposit that we recover, of course, by bringing back clothes that have become too small. *** TerraCycle is not a newcomer to the world of waste recovery and recycling. It was founded in 2001 when young Szaky was a student at Princeton. It was during a trip with friends from university to Montreal, at this time, that he saw for the first time worms transforming organic waste into compost and that he had the idea of make the first product of his waste recovery business. Today, about a third of the company's work is industrial waste, and the rest is our everyday consumer waste. The next challenge right now is, you guessed it, on the side of masks, gloves and all the disposable equipment used in the fight against COVID-19. “There's a whole new stream of waste here,” says Szaky. TerraCycle takes care of it.   But the real challenge, 20 years after the discovery of vermicomposting, is no longer concentrated at all towards the quest for new waste streams, new gold in the bins. The new frontier is logistics on a large scale, the search for solutions that work on a large scale and, above all, very, very large. Loop, for example, now operates on a large scale in the United Kingdom with the giant Tesco, in France with Carrefour, and in the United States with notably Walgreens and Burger King! Major players.   Currently, explains Mr. Szaky, there is a remarkable awakening of individuals to the need to produce less waste as well as to recover and reuse objects. Consumers' support is therefore less difficult to obtain than before. Loop's home in Toronto is one example, as is the proliferation of grocery stores offering unpackaged products. But the world of recovery and reuse is also becoming more complex, and the financial challenges are not trivial. The price of oil is low, so there is less reason to want to recover its derivatives otherwise. Also, the raw material is not what it was 20 years ago. There is less waste than before, they are lighter, packaging is often made with more complex materials, more difficult to work with and to break down. (Besides, Szaky thinks that packaging should be simplified, not become more and more multi-layered and multi-material.) Countries that bought waste from others became more demanding. We saw it, in Quebec, when China started to refuse our waste.   When I ask him if the company also intends to take new paths to integrate its work into larger, more global pollution reduction systems, Tom Szaky answers no. “You want to focus on one problem and be good,” he says. So Loop does not come with a guarantee of green transport, for example. It is up to the partners to then be consistent. In France, Carrefour is looking for a solution for “green” delivery. And can consumers do more to recycle better?   Should we buy everything second-hand? At TerraCycle, offices all over the planet are fitted out and furnished with recycled materials, used objects. “Actually, no,” Mr. Szaky replies. “What is needed more than anything is buying less. "

Procter & Gamble is among investors in round to fund Loop.

TerraCycle’s milkman-like delivery model, Loop, expands online and at brick-and-mortar locations. Kate Bertrand Connolly 1 | Nov 04, 2020 Following a successful pilot program that started in 2019, the Loop circular shopping platform from TerraCycle has expanded its online operation to provide an unlimited number of US consumers from coast to coast with home delivery of products packed in reusable packaging, as well as pickup of the empty packages. Loop also made its brick-and-mortar debut recently, in France. “Carrefour just brought Loop into its first store,” says Eric Rosen, publicist, US public relations, for Loop/TerraCycle. “We anticipate Loop being in-store in other retailers in 2021.” Carrefour’s online Loop service launched in Paris last year. Following a successful pilot program that started in 2019, the Loop circular shopping platform from TerraCycle has expanded its online operation to provide an unlimited number of US consumers from coast to coast with home delivery of products packed in reusable packaging, as well as pickup of the empty packages. Loop also made its brick-and-mortar debut recently, in France. “Carrefour just brought Loop into its first store,” says Eric Rosen, publicist, US public relations, for Loop/TerraCycle. “We anticipate Loop being in-store in other retailers in 2021.” Carrefour’s online Loop service launched in Paris last year. In the United States, consumers will find Loop products at Kroger stores starting in 2021. Also in North America, Burger King and Tim Hortons restaurants plan to launch Loop pilot projects next year. Loop’s online scale-up coincides with an explosion in internet shopping and home delivery fueled by the COVID-19 virus, though it’s also a natural next step considering the success of the pilot program. More than 100,000 people have signed up for the service to date. With the online version of Loop, consumers buy products that have been filled into reusable packaging made, for example, of metal or glass. They then return the empty packages to Loop, which cleans the packages for refilling by Loop’s brand partners. Loop packs consumer orders into reusable totes for delivery, and consumers return the empty packaging to Loop using the same totes. Loop products are packed and shipped from the company’s New Jersey warehouse to all US ZIP codes. (Frozen products are only shipped to locations where delivery can be made within 24 hours.) The platform launched in 2019 as a pilot program in the Mid-Atlantic United States and Paris, France. In July 2020, Loop launched online in the United Kingdom, working in partnership with retailer Tesco. A Canadian online launch is planned for Toronto in February 2021. Loop has expanded rapidly vis-à-vis brand partners and product selection, now offering more than 80 brands and 400 products in the United States and Europe. Product categories include grocery, beauty, health and personal care, and household essentials. Brand owners range from giants like Nestlé and Procter & Gamble to start-ups like Soapply. Next year will be an important one for Loop in brick-and-mortar restaurants and stores. Burger King plans to start a pilot Loop program in 2021 that will offer eat-in and to-go customers sandwiches and drinks packed in returnable, reusable food containers and cups. Consumers who choose the reusable packaging will pay a deposit when they place their order and get the deposit back after returning the packaging to Burger King. The pilot will start in select Burger King restaurants in New York City; Portland, Oregon; and Tokyo, with additional cities to join in the months that follow. Canada’s Tim Hortons quick-service restaurant chain has announced a similar Loop pilot. The program will start in 2021 at select Tim Hortons restaurants in Toronto. Also starting next year, US consumers will be able to visit Loop in-store at select Kroger locations. The plan for Loop in brick-and-mortar stores is not only to sell Loop products but also to collect the empty packaging for cleaning and reuse. Loop publicist Rosen discusses the program’s burgeoning expansion, both online and in-store, in this exclusive Packaging Digest Q&A. How many brick-and-mortar retailers in the United States will be selling Loop products in 2021? Is this a channel Loop is interested in exploring further? What have consumers said about their willingness (or not) to take empty packages back to a physical store? Rosen: As of now, in the United States, there will be one brick-and-mortar retailer, Kroger, selling Loop products in-store in 2021. There are, however, many retailers who are and will be integrating Loop into their ecommerce platforms. Yes, [in-store] is a channel Loop is pursuing and will continue to pursue. In fact, Loop just opened in its first brick-and-mortar retailer — Carrefour in France. As for consumers’ willingness to take empties back to a physical store, while we haven’t surveyed consumers, we believe returning empty packaging will be embraced. When will Loop be expanding into additional markets in Europe and Asia, either online or via brick-and-mortar stores? Rosen: Loop will be launching in Canada, Australia, and Japan in 2021. We will continue to seek opportunities to launch in other countries and will be announcing more as we solidify plans. How will Loop, brand owners, and/or retailers educate consumers about how in-store Loop works and its benefits? Rosen: Loop, brand owners, and retailers educate consumers through websites, social media, and earned media placements in outlets worldwide.

Now that the Loop program is national in the United States, how many locations are cleaning the empty, returned packages?

Rosen: In the United States, the cleaning facility is in Pennsylvania. We will be adding facilities as we scale.

What, if anything, has changed in the logistics of the Loop program (outgoing and incoming packages)? What, if anything, has changed with the lifecycle analysis of the packages sold in the Loop program because of the additional distances?

Rosen: Nothing has changed in the logistics. Based on Loop’s third-party lifecycle analysis, creating a durable (or “reusable”) container uses more energy and resources than creating a disposable (or “single-use”) container. However, over time, the reusable container has a lower environmental and economic cost, as it does not need to be remanufactured on every use. Instead, it is transported and cleaned, which is a much lower environmental cost. According to Loop, the efficiency of a reusable package in Loop is even more evident as consumers participate repeatedly. After two to three uses of the packaging, the environmental impact is breakeven. By 10 uses, there is a more than 35% reduction in environmental impacts.

Are all products still being shipped to consumers from Loop’s New Jersey warehouse? Is that still the plan moving forward, to have just one warehouse?

Rosen: Loop’s New Jersey warehouse ships all products in the United States. As we scale, we intend to have additional warehousing in other parts of the country. The Loop warehouse in France is in Lille, and the one in the United Kingdom is in Crick.

How well are the durable packages holding up to use, cleaning, and reuse? Are the brands getting the number of uses they hoped they would?

Rosen: The durable packaging is holding up well as it goes through Loop cycles. I can’t comment on the brands, and what their expectations were/are.

Is UPS still Loop’s only partner for deliveries/pickups? Are there any plans for additional delivery services to be involved, especially as volumes and delivery areas are growing?

Rosen: Yes, Loop’s US logistics partner is UPS. In France, it’s Colisweb, and in the UK, it’s DPD. There are no plans for additional delivery services to be involved.

The allergen warning on the Loop website states: “Please note that the Loop Tote is packed in a facility that may have handled wheat, milk, eggs, tree nuts, peanuts, and soy, and may contain traces of the same. If you or someone in your family has a serious food allergy, Loop may not be for you.” Are there any plans to address this, so people can safely order Loop products without worry from allergens?

Rosen: There are no current plans to address this.

Who designs the Loop packages?

Rosen: Each brand partner is responsible for the design of its packaging. All packaging must be approved by Loop.

What is the size range of Loop packages?

Rosen: The smallest container is 20 ml (less than an ounce) for Tea Tree Oil from The Body Shop. The biggest package is an 8-lb container for kitty litter from Purina.

How have consumers reacted to Loop since its launch last year?

Rosen: We have had an overwhelmingly positive response to Loop since its launch. In fact, meeting consumer demand is what led to the rapid expansion — from 10 states to every ZIP code in the contiguous 48 states. We have more than 100,000 sign-ups, and that continues to grow.