Credit: Tesco
Leading UK supermarkets announce further plans to remove plastic packaging with soft plastic and detergent pod boxes in their sights
Waitrose and Tesco have today announced fresh measures to crack down on plastic waste, as the two supermarket giants advanced efforts to deliver on their waste and recycling goals.
Waitrose & Partners announced it has launched soft-plastic recycling collections at 295 stores across the UK following a successful trial, while Tesco pledged to cut 252 tonnes of plastic from its laundry detergent pod packaging a year by switching to cardboard boxes.
In addition to recycling carrier bags in store, Waitrose customers will now be able to return soft-plastic bread, frozen food, cereal, salad, pasta and rice bags, as well as wrapping from toilet roll, cheese, fish, meat, crisps, biscuits, and chocolate products, provided the returned plastic items are clean and dry.
According to Waitrose, film and flexible plastic packaging accounts for around 25 per cent of all consumer packaging, but is often not collected by councils through kerbside recycling services.
Plastic collected in store will be sent to a reprocessor in Glasgow for washing and separation before being flaked or pelletised so it can be made into new products such as secondary packaging, shrink wrap, delivery or carrier bags, refuse sacks or guttering, buckets or plastic furniture, the company said.
Caroline Pinnell, sustainability and ethics specialist at Waitrose, explained that offering flexible plastic recycling across a number of the retailer's 331 shops in England, Scotland, Wales and the Channel Islands met a "key priority" for its environmentally savvy consumers.
"Across both Waitrose and John Lewis, we are continuing to strip away single-use packaging and provide our customers with convenient reuse, refill and recycling solutions," she said.
"We are on track to meet our 2023 Waitrose packaging target, that all of our own-brand packaging will be reusable or made from widely recyclable or home-compostable material by the end of 2023, two years ahead of the industry-wide WRAP UK Plastic Pact."
Meanwhile, Tesco today separately announced plans to replace laundry detergent pod packaging with a recyclable cardboard alternative in a bid to save 252 tonnes of plastic and over four million pieces of plastic across eight lines.
The new FSC certified boxes contain more than 90 per cent recycled cardboard and contain only a thin plastic liner inside to protect the pods. When empty, they can be put in a normal household recycle bin.
The move comes as part of Tesco's 4Rs packaging strategy to reduce plastic waste by reducing its use, encouraging reuse and recycling what's left. Since its August 2019 launch the scheme has removed 1.8 billion pieces of plastic and reduced packaging by more than 10,000 tonnes across product lines such as fruit juices, crisps and cheese.
Waitrose and Tesco's announcements join a wave of waste reduction measures announced by British supermarkets since the turn of the year.
Sainsbury's, for example, this week revealed that it has shelved mince tray packaging in favour of vacuum-packed alternative using less than half the plastic earlier this week, having already launched £2 fruit and vegetable boxes in more than 200 stores and recently completed a three-month hydrogen truck trial.
Additionally, Aldi has announced it is to extend its partnership with food waste app Too Good To Go to cover all its 990 UK stores, while Tesco is teaming up with five of its largest vegetable suppliers to launch the UK's "biggest ever" commercial rollout of low carbon fertilisers.
In January Waitrose also revealed it is to replace the majority of its small wine bottles with aluminium cans in a bid to curb the carbon footprint of its packaging and became the first UK supermarket to sell own brand tea bags suitable for home composting.
