In conversation with Alice Rackley, CEO of Polytag
Consumer pressure and global legislation mean that tackling packaging waste is now a business imperative for retailers, not just a nice-to-have. Ocado, M&S and Waitrose are setting the standard, using Polytag’s technology to track recycling behaviours, meet compliance and design more sustainable packaging.
Alice Rackley, CEO of Polytag, spoke to us about the power of making data visible and why collaboration is the only way to make circularity mainstream.
Tell us about the particular part of the sustainability challenge you’re helping retailers to solve and why it’s important.
Alice: We’re helping retailers with their circular economy goals, which are going to be a core part of every business strategy because of two big pressures: consumers and legislation.
On the consumer side, people are increasingly demanding that brands operate in more circular ways and, if they don’t, customers will shop elsewhere. Then there’s legislation: across the world, governments are introducing rules that both incentivise and penalise businesses, depending on how circular they are.
Recycling has always been a black hole in the supply chain, but we’re helping to open it up. Our technology is bringing transparency to supply chains and giving retailers data they’ve never had before. With this data they can benchmark progress accurately, calculate taxes correctly, and see what happens to products after they’ve been thrown away.
What gets measured gets managed, so by shining a light on what happens at the very end of the supply chain, we’re helping businesses meet compliance and to think differently about how they operate in a circular way.
This summer, Ocado rolled out Polytag across 100+ own-label products. What data is this giving Ocado about recycling behaviours and how are they using it?
Alice: What’s exciting about Ocado is that they’re really embracing Polytag across their entire own-label range. They’re using two different formats that tell two sides of the circularity story.
The first is a visible QR code. When a customer scans it on, say, a bottle of milk, it takes them to a page specific to that product. Ocado can customise that page to share whatever’s most relevant, such as its sustainability commitments, farming practices or clear recycling guidance. It reinforces Ocado’s position as a retailer that genuinely invests in sustainable practices.
The second format is our invisible UV tag. You can’t see it on the packaging, but when that same bottle reaches a recycling centre equipped with Polytag technology, a UV light reveals a hidden grid of codes containing the product’s barcode number. That’s what gives Ocado proof of recycling at a barcode level. It’s powerful data that supports compliance with new legislation, such as Extended Producer Responsibility, and helps it track progress over time.
With these two formats, Ocado can do something really unique: communicate their sustainability story to customers while also capturing the hard evidence needed to meet regulatory demands and improve performance. It’s a brilliant example of how data and storytelling come together in the circular economy.
How have M&S implemented Polytag and what tangible results or recycling changes have you seen?
Alice: Working with M&S and Waitrose has been fascinating because it shows how different retailers can approach the same challenge in ways that suit their brand and customers.
The focus for M&S has been transparency and traceability. They’ve been keen to understand exactly what happens to their packaging once it enters the recycling stream. By using Polytag, they’re now able to capture barcode-level proof of recycling.
That’s given them the confidence to meet upcoming legislation, but also a new story to tell customers about how their packaging really is being recycled. It’s moving them from intention to evidence.
It’s a great outcome: for the first time, retailers are no longer blind once packaging goes into the bin. They have real, actionable data they can use to report, comply and design better packaging. That shift from assumption to evidence is what’s going to change recycling behaviours over time.
How have consumers responded to the ‘scan to recycle’ and tagging technology you introduced? And what does good user-centred design look like in this space?
Alice: There’s a wave of legislation coming in: Extended Producer Responsibility, the Plastic Packaging Tax, Deposit Return Schemes, and digital waste tracking. It all puts pressure on brands to not only be responsible but also to prove it with data. But legislation alone doesn’t change behaviour. Consumers have to be part of the picture.
One of the best examples we’ve seen is a rewards-for-recycling scheme we ran with Ocado, using a rewards app called Bower. We applied serialised QR codes across its milk range and when customers scanned the code, they could download the app and claim a 20p cash reward for recycling their bottle.
In just 55 days, we awarded 20,000 20 pences. It wasn’t heavily promoted and people discovered it almost by accident. The app confirmed that bottles were recycled in the correct bins and Ocado could see on their Polytag dashboard exactly where, down to a five-metre radius, every bottle was recycled.
Consumers loved it and they weren’t just claiming once: the average user recycled 7.5 bottles, building a weekly habit of recycling. Even when the cash rewards ran out, people continued to use the app to collect points. It proved that if you design with users in mind, make it easy and make it rewarding, people will go the extra mile to do the right thing. Brands, in turn, get data-rich insights they’ve never had before.
What’s the future for recycling technology and making circularity mainstream?
Alice: No single company will solve the challenge of circularity alone so the future of RecTech has to be collaborative. Through innovation, sharing data and alignment with global standards, we can turn recycling from a fragmented system into a seamless, scalable solution. That’s how we’ll make circularity the norm, not the exception.
We’re clear that Polytag is not the silver bullet. We’re one part of a much bigger puzzle. But by connecting our technology with others, and scaling globally, we can make a big difference in how packaging is tracked, recycled and kept in circulation.
One last quickfire question: what book or podcast would you recommend?
Alice: Consumed: How Big Brands Got Us Hooked on Plastic, by Saabira Chaudhuri. She was a New York Times journalist for a decade, covering plastics and recycling, and her insights are fantastic. She was also recently a guest on the Talking Rubbish Podcast, which I’ve been on too. Both are great for anyone interested in the global plastics challenge.
