Ardagh partners with Chicago’s Don’t Trash Glass program

Ardagh Glass Packaging-North America, an Indianapolis-based business of Ireland’s Ardagh Group, has partnered with Don’t Trash Glass to accelerate opportunities in Chicago and beyond for recycling and increasing recycled content in the manufacture of glass bottles.

Don’t Trash Glass is a program in collaboration with the Arlington, Virginia-based Glass Packaging Institute (GPI) and Phoenix-based Glass King Recovery & Recycling that encourages more bars, restaurants and local businesses to collect used glass bottles, separately from waste streams, to be turned into new bottles and improve regional recycling rates.

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“Ardagh is an advocate for recycling initiatives that ensure a source of high-quality recycled glass, such as the Don’t Trash Glass program,” says Brian Brandstatter, president and CEO of Ardagh Glass Packaging-North America. “The partnership symbolizes our commitment to improving regional glass collection and recycling while advancing the circularity of glass bottles.”

Ardagh says that last year the program collected 2.2 million pounds of glass from bars, restaurants and local businesses in its first-year partnership with Diageo North America in Illinois. Glass bottles and containers are then sorted and turned into cullet for the Ardagh production facility to use to manufacture new bottles.

“Glass is 100 percent recyclable and can be recycled endlessly without any loss in quality or purity,” GPI President Scott DeFife says. “Through Ardagh’s partnership, we are capitalizing on an untapped source of glass bottles from bars and restaurants to manufacture new bottles within the same region.”

The Don’t Trash Glass pilot program launched in 2021 in the Greater Chicago area. Once collected, bottles are temporarily stored to be processed and then used by regional glass packaging manufacturers like Ardagh, aiming to keep glass bottles out of landfills. Based on its success in Chicago, the program now has been expanded to Kentucky, among other locations.

“Partners are pivotal to making this program work,” says Rose King, chief operating officer of Glass King Recovery & Recycling. “Our partners can see the impact of their commitment on local businesses and the circularity of bottles.”