Packaging and recycling

Packaging has a place, it protects our food and keeps it fresher and safe for longer. We want to keep plastics and packaging out of the oceans by using less and making our products easy to recycle. Find out what we’re doing to make a difference.

Our story so far

We've always been at the forefront of removing hidden plastic and unnecessary packaging, moving from 46% of our products able to be recycled at home or in store to 96%. Since 2018 we have removed 8,213 tonnes of plastic packaging from our own brand products, as well as carrier bags. Our reliance on virgin or ‘new’ plastic has been greatly reduced and we now use 44% recycled content across the plastic packaging used in our own-brand products that customers take home.

How we've made a difference

Milk bottle tops

Our milk bottle tops are now clear, making it easier for recycle machines to recycle them with the bottles.

Water bottles

Our own-brand still, sparkling, flavoured water, carbonated drinks and mixer bottles (excluding caps and labels) are made from 100% recycled material.

Pizza trays

In 2017, we introduced new, corrugated cardboard pizza discs preventing 200 tonnes of polystyrene boards going to landfill per year.

Tomato trays

670k packets of cherry and baby plum tomatoes have been moved into cardboard saving 68 tonnes of plastic per year.

Compostable carrier bags

We were the first retailer to replace single-use plastic carriers with compostable carrier bags which so far has removed around 55 million single-use plastic bags from circulation.

Mushroom punnets

Our mushrooms don’t come in black packaging anymore so they can be easily recycled.

Tissue boxes

Our tissue boxes are fully made from FSC paper, without plastic so they can be recycled.

Soft plastics are lightweight plastics that often cannot be placed in recycling bins at home. Think plastic film lids on yoghurt pots, soft fruit punnets and ready meals, as well as plastic crisp packets, pasta bags and chocolate or biscuit wrappers.

Recycle your soft plastic recycling in store – just follow these three steps

Clean it – First, rinse your packaging out.
Scrunch it – Now, scrunch it up tight - if it pings back, it’s a useful indicator it's soft plastic.
Pop to Co-op – To use our soft plastics recycling unit – look out for the blue bin at your local Co-op

Thanks to our pioneering work in this area, new recycling rules mean that by 31 March 2027, kerbside plastic film collections from households will be introduced.