Several states in the US have recently passed legislation that, when implemented, may affect not only brands but the broader packaging supply chain selling across regulatory boundaries.
Meet Ameripen
The American Institute for Packaging and Environment, or Ameripen, is a trade organization that advocates and lobbies for the entire packaging value chain at the local, state and federal regulatory level.
Dan Felton, executive director of Ameripen, told CosmeticsDesign that while some level of sustainable packaging regulation isn’t entirely new to the CPG industry in the US, states like California are bringing in more aggressive standards.
“A lot of the policies that are coming out are making some of those sustainability decisions for the brand owners and manufacturers,” Felton said. “Companies are trying to do the right thing, but some policymakers are really pushing the envelope in making some decisions for those brand owners.”
Despite that, Felton said Ameripen is supportive of some of the regulations coming online. Generally speaking, there are three main types of state regulation Ameripen is monitoring and Felton believes will impact the cosmetics world.
Click through to read about these regulations.
Also known as EPR, extended producer responsibility legislation has cropped up across the US, with laws passed and signed in Maine and Oregon in 2021 and California and Colorado this year.
Felton said, while this type of regulation is new in the US, the packaging supply chain internationally has been working with EPR regulations for about 30 years and companies selling in the EU or Canada are already familiar with the process.
Essentially, Felton said EPR regulation transfers the burden of responsibility for recycling and recovery from consumers and municipal governments to the packaging supply chain.
That can mean the transfer of recycling operations, but more often companies have to join a producer responsibility organization, PRO, to which it will pay fees. Felton said in many PROs, a company can reduce fees based on the packaging type it uses, like higher recycled-content packaging.
“In the beauty industry, some of the packaging is hard to recycle today,” Felton said. “It doesn't enjoy the recovery system as, for instance, beverage containers. One potentially good thing about these new programs coming online is they may be able to help increase the infrastructure for those harder to recycle materials, including for the beauty industry.”
Ameripen is supportive of EPR legislation which aligns with its vision, Felton said. He also noted that none of the EPR regulations passed in the US has been implemented yet.
As companies set their own recycled-content goals, four states have also passed requirements for recycled content, two of which will affect the beauty industry.
Felton said the recycled content requirements in Washington and New Jersey are likely to ask beauty brands to comply with the new guidelines.
The law in Washington already specifically lists personal care as an industry that will be required to meet the recycled content requirement and Felton said there is reason to believe the New Jersey law will include beauty during the rule-making process.
Neither of those regulations have been fully implemented yet, and Felton said there still may be an opportunity for the cosmetics industry to engage in the rule-making process.
Last year California passed a law altering how companies are able to label for recyclability.
While companies have historically turned to Federal Trade Commission guidance on standards for labeling products as recyclable, California’s new law will set entirely different standards for the use of the chasing arrow symbol.
Specifically, the National Law Review says California will require a material characterization study to be submitted by the beginning of 2024 so the state can determine what products and packaging can use the chasing arrows recycling symbol.
The law also sets criteria for other sustainable packaging claims, like recyclable.
Felton said this law may cause friction for some companies, with more than 30 laws nationally requiring the chasing arrows symbol and resin identification code on packaging.
“You've got the cosmetics industry already doing that, and now you have California potentially saying you can't do that anymore,” Felton said. “That means California has a different way to label things than 49 other states in the US, which could be a very big problem for some brand owners.”
