NORTH AMERICA – The popular make-up store, Sephora, is rolling out its first on-store recycling program across the United States and Canada to help with cosmetics waste.
Launched in partnership with Pact Collective, the program dubbed the Beauty (Re)Purposed initiative, will allow customers to return empty beauty packaging from any brand at more than 600 Sephora locations all over North America.
The empty packaging will then be recycled into new materials such as new packaging, carpet, asphalt, or pallets, diverting the waste from landfills.
Once enough volume has been collected, Pact will sell the collected materials to a partner that will turn the material into something else, such as carpet, pallets, asphalt, new packaging or energy.
Desta Raines, Director of Sustainability at Sephora said: “The launch of the Beauty (Re)Purposed program is an exciting step forward in Sephora’s commitment to leading the industry and offering more sustainable solutions for the communities we serve.
“The reality is that discarding beauty packaging can be complex for many consumers. It was important for Sephora to find a partner like Pact who shares our values and, in collaboration, can help to educate our clients and the broader industry in making the process more accessible for all.”
Currently, almost 80 percent of all plastic ends up in landfills or as pollution and 8 million tonnes of plastic end up in our oceans every single year.
Together, the beauty and wellness industries generate 120 billion packages every year, most of which aren’t accepted in curbside recycling programs.
The new program will operate alongside Sephora’s longstanding partnership with G2 Revolution, a specialty recycling solutions company, to divert returned, damaged or expired cosmetic product waste from landfills. G2 will now provide support to Beauty (Re)Repurposed with Pact.
“Partnering with a major player like Sephora is a critical step in scaling our collection program and making it more widely available to beauty shoppers,” said Carly Snider, Program Director at Pact in a statement.
“Together, we’re excited to take responsibility for beauty’s packaging problem and encourage more sustainable packaging decisions to drive industry-wide change.”
Alongside the Sephora launch, Pact is also announcing a new brand partnership with Benefit, allowing customers to mail in up to five empties per month for free.
Benefit’s director for U.S. e-commerce, Joanne Marzan noted: “We want to provide our consumers with easy solutions to do good. Offering a takeback program via this partnership with Pact is important to us to move towards a more sustainable future.”
Some brands that are already offering take-back programs, like MAC Cosmetics, Susanne Kaufman and Farmacy, incentivize customers to recycle via their Pact programs with points redeemable against future products.
Sephora’s partnership with Pact does not include a loyalty program component, which does seem like a missed opportunity, considering its 30 million members. Raines said the company has no immediate plans to integrate the loyalty program.
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