Preparing for the Holiday Waste Surge: A Retailer’s Guide to Managing Packaging Waste

As anyone who works in retail knows, the run-up to Christmas is a peak time for the industry. Between serving customers queuing out the door, restocking shelves, and managing inventory, you need to find a way to handle the extra packaging that accumulates.

Our guide is here to help you reduce waste around Christmas and handle excess packaging responsibly.

Why is there more packaging at Christmas?

The increase in packaging and waste in the retail sector at Christmas boils down to supply and demand.  

According to Defra, the additional waste produced over the festive season is estimated to be over 3 million tonnes. And as shoppers stock up for the holiday season, retailers must ensure they have enough on the shelves, whether in warehouses for online sales or in physical shops and stores. 

The higher volume of shipments and deliveries leads to more packaging to deal with. This might include:

• Cardboard trays and boxes
• Plastic boxes and containers
• Plastic wrap
• Bubble wrap
• Paper
• Packing peanuts
• Insulating packaging for refrigerated goods
• Sticky tape and parcel tape
• Sticky labels

What does additional packaging mean for retail businesses?

As retailers stock up on additional goods, excess packaging can soon stack up. This requires careful waste management to keep spaces free from clutter and hazards.

However, the more packaging that ends up in general waste, the more businesses pay in landfill tax. As such, throwing excess packaging into refuse bins can become expensive. Additionally, a lack of recycling can harm your business’s green credentials.

How retailers can reduce waste around Christmas

Minimising waste and handling it responsibly can seem challenging for retailers at Christmas. Here are some actionable tips to make the process more manageable and efficient.

1. Arrange a Wastesaving Audit

If you’re unsure what your current waste levels are and how you can improve them ahead of the Christmas season, we recommend booking a Wastesaving Audit. This will give you a clearer idea of how you are handling waste at the moment and identify opportunities to lower costs and reduce your retail business’s carbon footprint. 

Our experts can conduct an audit through a video call at your convenience. Please contact us to learn more.

2. Invest in balers and compactors

Balers and compactors are valuable pieces of machinery in the retail sector. They work by compressing waste into smaller bundles, helping with storage, transportation, and disposal.

Many retailers find balers and compactors beneficial for reducing waste volumes, creating a tidier and safer environment, and increasing recycling rates

• Balers: A baler is perfect for dealing with recyclable waste. Depending on the retail waste you handle most, you may wish to invest in a cardboard baler, ideal for transforming boxes into neat bundles, a plastic baler, which can greatly reduce the amount of space taken up by plastics such as PET, or a multi-chamber baler that handles both cardboard and plastic.

Take a look at our guide for advice on choosing the right baler for your business.

• Compactors: For non-recyclable waste, including certain types of plastic, you can benefit from a compactor. These machines compress the waste so it takes up less room in bins, bags, and skips.

3. Schedule waste collections smartly

It’s worth planning ahead and getting waste scheduled in regularly throughout the run-up to Christmas so your recycling and general waste bins are never overflowing. Some service providers also offer flexible, on-demand collections so you can adapt your waste management to the volume at hand. 

4. Separate your waste at the source

Rather than putting all your mixed recyclables into a single bin or bag, separate them right away. This can speed up your retail holiday waste management considerably.

5. Consider selling excess cardboard