Iceland has called on the government to push ahead with plans to introduce a national deposit return scheme (DRS) for plastic bottles following the success of trials within its stores.
The retailer revealed that it has recycled more than 1 million plastic bottles since May last year when it rolled reverse vending machines to five stores located across the UK.
It also highlighted that the trial had received “extremely positive” feedback from its customers, with 96% of shoppers believing DRS should be extended to all retailers.
Motivated by environmental concerns, Iceland found that two thirds of customers were using the machines at least once a fortnight, and 75% believed the introduction of 20p deposits on plastic bottles would be a good idea.
Richard Walker, Managing Director at Iceland, commented: “The results from our reverse vending machine trials highlight the growing demand from consumers to have a deposit return scheme introduced across the UK.
“Iceland was the first retailer to trial reverse vending machines and we believe the customer feedback we have received shows that our simple model of accepting all sizes of plastic drinks bottle – and extending this to include drinks cans – is the only sensible way to roll out a deposit return scheme nationally.”
He added: “We have more than 950 stores across the UK and with the support of the government we could fit a reverse vending machine in every one of our stores. With over 1 million bottles returned to just five of our stores, the positive environmental impact of having machines across the UK would be phenomenal.”
Morrisons, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, and the Co-op have all been testing reverse vending machine in their stores amid an increasing drive by the retail industry to reduce single use plastic waste and improve recycling rates.
Environment Secretary Michael Gove recently revealed that the government was moving forward with plans for ‘all-in’ deposit return scheme that would require retailers to take back plastic drinks bottles, aluminium and steel cans and glass bottles, with no limits on the size of the container that can be returned. However, retail bodies have warned that such as a scheme would place a costly burden on smaller, local shops.
