Getting a refresh

Knowledge is power, and consumers know what the How2Recycle label is. Even if they can’t name our organization, when they see our label, they see what they perceive as helpful disposal instructions.

Our How2Recycle program issues the most recognizable on-pack disposal instructions across the United States and Canada. We’ve issued labels for hundreds of thousands of packaging products and for brands consumers know, such as Amazon and Walmart. The reach of our label is one of our greatest assets, and its brand recognition is one of our greatest achievements.

In recent rounds of consumer testing, we’ve seen that recognition of our label remains steady, but we don’t need research to tell us recycling is changing.

Between legislative changes, eroded trust in recycling among consumers and changes to recyclability, the landscape is evolving. With our How2Recycle Forward campaign, the How2Recycle program is evolving, too, and that evolution begins with a design refresh of the nation’s most recognizable label.

The case for refreshing the How2Recycle label design

Right now, we’re seeing seismic changes in the world of recycling. One of the biggest drivers behind these changes is the public. A lack of trust in recycling is growing, with people citing statistics saying only 9 percent of plastics are recycled. When it comes to recycling, people are asking, “Should I even bother?”

Good politicians follow public sentiment and turn their constituents’ requests into concrete regulations. Now, in five states across the country, we’ve seen legislatures pass and governors sign into law extended producer responsibility (EPR) legislation for packaging. EPR—which is just getting started, by the way—compels companies to take responsibility for their end-of-life packaging and provide education for consumers on sustainability and recycling.

Along with EPR legislation, we’re also seeing bills regulating the “chasing arrows” symbol on packaging—potentially raising new barriers to labeling something with the widely recognized recycling symbol.

I know when we talk about changes to recycling, it’s easy to get reactive. To ask questions like: How can I comply with California’s new legislation? How will this law affect our environmental, sustainability and corporate governance, or ESG, goals?

It’s easy to be reactive, sure, but it’s not the right mindset. When it comes to working in a landscape as dynamic as recycling, we need to be proactive. We can respond to current changes—and we need to—but this watershed moment in recycling has shown it’s even more critical to refresh our label design with future adaptation in mind.

The work behind the label design refresh

You know that moment when your friend is about to throw away an unlabeled package even though it’s recyclable? Or when they recycle unlabeled packaging that should go in the trash? Well, I do—and maybe that’s because I work in the space—but that’s exactly the moment How2Recycle was made for.

Complying with recycling legislation is a vital part of our work, but consumer education—empowering people with the information they need to make an informed disposal decision—is at the heart of our mission.

When we provide our How2Recycle members with a label, we’re really giving them the means for educating a consumer at that critical point in their disposal decision-making process. That’s why, as part of our label design refresh, we’ve gone back to our roots and into the minds of consumers.

Back in 2012, How2Recycle started as a working group within GreenBlue’s Sustainable Packaging Coalition (SPC). Today, How2Recycle once again has partnered with SPC to work on the refreshed label’s design. Specifically, we’ve partnered with the program’s Packaging Design Collaborative, which comprises experts in packaging design and sustainability from across the value chain.

A key part of this work has been consumer testing to identify which combination of symbols, verbiage, layouts and designs were most comprehensible and actionable for consumers. In two rounds of quantitative consumer research, we surveyed more than 1,600 respondents and identified ways to meaningfully evolve the legacy How2Recycle label.

The potential of a refreshed label design

When we say we want to meaningfully evolve our legacy label that’s been issued on hundreds of thousands of packaging products, we mean we’re making it more actionable, accurate and inclusive. We’re doing that with two new offerings for our 800 members: How2Recycle Pro and How2Recycle Plus, which includes a dynamic QR code label featuring The Recycling Partnership’s Recycle Check.

Let’s first talk about action. At the end of the day, all our research, our sustainability goal-setting and our design efforts hinge on one action: consumer disposal. To create the most effective label, we prioritized research that would help us ensure our design would be interpreted as clear, easy-to-follow disposal instructions.

We haven’t stopped at the label either. We’re laying the groundwork to mobilize our members around EPR-mandated consumer education efforts that spark action, and we’re exploring the potential of in-store signage to encourage proper disposal behaviors.

To ensure accuracy, whenever the How2Recycle team designates a label, we draw from our ecosystem of third-party validated data, use the Federal Trade Commission’s Green Guides and review other substantiating recyclability information. As part of our How2Recycle Forward campaign, we’ve strengthened that data ecosystem to ensure legal compliance and to increase credibility and trust in recycling.

We’ve also started offering a dynamic How2Recycle Plus label that features Recycle Check. That dynamic label—one with a QR code—lets consumers scan to receive a clear, location-specific, yes-no answer on whether a material is recyclable in their communities. With these labels, we’re ensuring our instructions are accurate and legal no matter where or when they’re issued.

Finally, we’re making our instructions inclusive. We’re refreshing our label design to ensure that a diversity of people easily can understand the label. So, when a company chooses to adopt the dynamic How2Recycle Plus label, we’ll make sure the instructions are still clear to those without smartphones, strong service or the necessary tech savvy.

What could a refreshed label mean for our recycling system, scaling behavior change and our environment?

Imagine seeing a piece of recyclable packaging in nature. Imagine following its life cycle in reverse—all the way back to the consumer looking for instructions, failing to find them and deciding to toss it instead of recycle it. Go back to that consumer’s purchase, back to the product’s packaging application and back to the producer’s decision not to pursue a How2Recycle label.

Each step represents a point in a product’s life cycle that could have helped prevent environmental pollution. Right now, we’re seeing the consequences of problems like that, and we’re seeing them at scale. We’re seeing the global waste crisis at a tipping point.

What if we scaled the opposite—all of the right steps for getting end-of-life packaging into the right streams and keeping it out of our environment?

That’s the potential of the refreshed How2Recycle label. It has less to do with helping a company hit its sustainability goals, though it does help, and more with scaling a consumer behavior change that can help fix our recycling system and improve environmental outcomes.

Because we know that when we get clear, accurate, recognizable labels on-pack, we can restore consumers’ faith in recycling, drive informed disposal decisions and meaningfully address our global waste crisis.

Paul Nowak is the executive director of GreenBlue and the acting director of How2Recycle while Director Karen Hagerman is on maternity leave. More information is available on the How2Recycle website.