Information for district & city councils

Returnable packaging in your region

Waste issues are pervasive. The pressure is on to reduce waste to landfill, and legislation is pending that will see outright bans and polluter pays penalties come into action. The spotlight is–quite rightly–on single-use packaging as this makes up 1/3rd of plastic waste, and 1/2 of ocean litter.

With Again Again’s open technology platform, it is super simple for the public to use their phones, like library cards, to access the returnable containers that you offer them. It’s free for them unless they don’t return the containers in a timely manner. It’s cost effective for the vendors too - cheaper than single-use packaging.

Your council can use Again Again’s platform to enable circular management of returnable packaging in your region. Notably, you are well placed to support human resources in your region to activate behaviour change on the ground. The subsidisation of containers is a reasonable investment for councils to consider now that Again Again’s platform protects and assures this investment.

It’s all about behaviour change

We believe that the greatest impact a council can make is by activiating behaviour change, locally.

Most people are pretty set in their convenient ways, and many of them simply don’t get that there is a problem with single-use packaging–so why would they bother doing something else? They need help to come into the light.

Vendors–those who are not already driven to be a part of the solution–may be open to the idea of a returnable network, but sadly it is also our learned experience that unless they have some skin in the game, they mostly tell you they are behind something new, but also stick to their old ways too.

We really encourage councils to take this pretty seriously. Our observation is that councils that have supported community groups, like SUCFree Wanaka, to really activate change have (hands down) seen the greatest waste reduction. Other councils who have paid for cups and plonked them into cafes, full of hope, have had markedly less impact.

It is tempting to think that paying for all the containers and dropping them into your local food & beverage vendors will change behaviour. It probably won’t.

Leverage your investment

It is our learned experience that the most impactful action to get rid of SUP is to… get rid of it! If vendors stop offering it, the impact is immense. Second to this, vendors adding a charge to SUP is also powerful.

In the case that the council is contributing to the costs of establishing of a fleet of containers for vendors, we recommend that the benefits to the associated vendors are linked to a pricing structure that rewards these behaviours and drives behaviour change at the counter.

For full details of this proposal, please see here.

Funding options

This will Facilitate the lowest usage fees for vendors

If the cost of the containers is covered by the vendor (+/- council subsidy), this means that they will benefit from the lowest usage fees, and no tie-ins or monthly minimums.

This takes away all of the risk for vendors - and makes Again Again’s network cheaper than single-use. Every time the platform is used, the vendor also saves the cost of the SUP that they are avoiding.

Importantly, there are no monthly subscription fees. Our learned experience is that, except for the most committed vendors, subscription models don’t work, and in time, vendors drop out. The pay-per-use model we now run supports vendors staying in the network and developing growing adoption with their customers over time.

Case study

SUC Free Wanaka