Think of it as a deposit scheme, you borrow the packaging and then get your deposit back to spend on your favourite Lush products when you bring it back to your local Lush shop…
As part of Lush’s mission to ‘Leave the world Lusher than we found it’, Lush UK and Ireland have launched Bring It Back – a fresh new packaging returns scheme enabling customers to bring back any full-sized Lush plastic packaging to their local Lush shop to be recycled. For each plastic Lush item returned, customers will receive a 50p deposit to spend on their Lush basket that day.
The returned packaging will then be sent to the Greenhub, Lush’s UK recycling hub, where packaging is processed and sent to our UK partners to be remoulded into new black Lush pots or used as industry feedstock material.
We are the difference in the cosmetic industry, we have the ideas and the passion, it’s then about making those ideas a reality by getting everyone to join in. So spread the word, let’s put some positivity into plastic, after all it’s not plastic that’s the baddy, we’re the baddies when we don’t reduce, reuse and recycle it! Don’t be a baddy, be a Lushie and claim your 50p deposit!
LUSH CO-FOUNDER AND PRODUCT INVENTOR, ROWENA BIRD
WHAT ABOUT LUSH’S OTHER RETURN SCHEMES?
The Bring It Back scheme will join Lush’s pre-existing fresh face mask scheme allowing customers to bring back five items of Lush plastic packaging in exchange for a fresh mask. This existing scheme sees over 500k pots come back to Lush’s Greenhub each year. Lush also offers a Knot Swap scheme where customers can return their Lush labelled Knot Wraps (Lush’s reusable alternative to traditional gift wrap) in exchange for 50% off another Knot Wrap of the same size.
WHY NOW?
When Lush’s Earthcare team learnt that even with all the domestic recycling programmes across many countries, only around 9-20% of plastics are recycled, it got under their skin!
At Lush the majority of plastic packaging used is from recycled and recyclable plastic. However, Lush wants to take even more ownership of their plastic packaging and ensure their bottles, pots and tubs are given the new life they should have.
“We are working hard to offer people the ultimate waste-free shopping experience. We continue to invent revolutionary naked products, unique packaging materials, work on reusable plastic packaging items as well as looking into refilling options for the future. This recycling scheme is another step on our path to leaving the world Lusher than we found it.
By moving towards a deposit-style scheme, whereby Lush customers know that they are ‘renting’ the packaging and can simply return it when they are finished, we keep the responsibility of waste-reduction and resource recycling as a company responsibility. All we need our customers to do is simply return their empties to us – we’ll take care of the rest.”
Rae Stanton-Smithson, Lush Earthcare
T&C’s of the Bring It Back scheme can be found here.
