Consumers want more environmentally friendly cosmetic products. To help companies in the industry meet these expectations, the FEBEA (French Federation of Beauty Companies) and Citeo (an eco-organization that works to reduce the environmental impact of packaging) are launching their guide “Designing for better recycling in France”. More particularly intended for the VSE-SMEs of the sector, it reviews, through seven emblematic products, the main challenges of the cosmetics industry in terms of packaging recycling.
Today, 64% of cosmetics consumers spontaneously classify recyclability as the primary criterion for environmentally friendly packaging. And 81% of French people want to commit themselves to reduce the environmental and societal impact of products.
Sensitive to this issue, the entire cosmetics sector has already made significant efforts in terms of recyclability of its packaging: today, nearly 80% of cosmetics packaging (glass, cardboard, steel or aluminum) is sorted and recycled. Concerning plastic packaging, bottles and flasks can already be sorted throughout the country. Thanks to the extension of sorting instructions, other plastic packaging (jars, boxes, tubes, flexible bags, films, etc.) can be sorted by the end of the year by 50% of the French population, until the generalisation of sorting by 2022-2023. Hence the importance of constantly improving the recyclability of each of these types of packaging.
Seven products screened for recyclability
In order to support all cosmetic companies in this dynamic, and more particularly SMEs and VSEs, FEBEA and Citeo have drawn up a practical guide for them.
Each container can pose particular recycling problems… unless it is designed from the outset with good practices in mind, this guide proposes a set of concrete solutions to improve the recyclability of …
