So you've decided to create a take-back program for your business. In this guide, we break down how to launch a successful take-back program, including how to:

• Establish Your Vision and Goals
• Determine Your Plan for Goods Received
• Choose Your Strategic Partners
• Choose Your Acceptable Goods
• Structure Your Customer and Operational Components
• Develop Your Mail-In Package
• Launch, Monitor, Track, and Share Your Data
• Produce Your Mail-Back Kit with EcoEnclose

We recommend starting with our Intro to Take-Back Programs for foundational information and guidance.

Before you do anything else, ask yourself:

Why are you embarking on a take-back program?

Take-back programs can accidentally or intentionally become token efforts at circularity if they are not part of a broader sustainability strategy for your brand.

If you’ve committed through efforts such as:

• Sustainable sourcing
• Sustainable manufacturing
• Ethical labor force
• Maintaining responsible inventory and production levels
• Producing quality/durable goods

… then a take-back program can be an effective addition to helping your conscious consumers responsibly manage the end of life for your products.

However, suppose you’ve done none of those things. In that case, we recommend halting - and looking for opportunities to make changes across your broader business strategy that can have a bigger environmental impact than a take-back program.

Once you’ve decided to institute a take-back program, set an overarching vision and some tangible goals.

Examples include:

Vision is to be Zero Waste

My goal is that less than 20% of my products are landfilled, incinerated or end up as litter. As such, I want 80% of my products to be resold, donated, repurposed, or recycled. My take-back program is an effort to reclaim my products at the end of their useful life and put the valuable resources in that product back into circulation.

Vision is to be Circular

I believe that fashion should be truly circular, meaning that my garments are ideally made from garments and become garments in their next life. My take-back program is an effort to secure my apparel back at the end of its useful life, so I can repurpose or recycle those raw materials back into yarn and textiles. Then, I can use these materials in future products, setting the foundation for my business to be fully circular long-term.

Vision is to Inspire Conscious Consumption

I believe most consumers don’t realize how excessively they are purchasing apparel today. My goal is to sell them a high-quality capsule wardrobe to help them avoid excessive apparel purchasing and to give them a take-back option to help give them insight into how much they purchase, incentivizing them to move away from fast fashion long-term.

Establishing this vision up front is vital.

You can see how the first vision drives different actions than the last one. With the last one, you likely would not provide discounts on future orders as an incentive, encouraging another round of consumption. Still, you might donate on your customer's behalf or offer a free repair service.

With the second, you may be more likely to only accept your own apparel whose fabric may be more likely to be recycled back into usable fabric, whereas, with the first, you might be more flexible with what you receive, recognizing that most of it would be donated or downcycled.

Once you have your vision, it’s time to move into the tactical aspects of creating a take-back program.

Before you start receiving products from customers, you need a plan for handling and processing them.

Likely, your goods will need to be sorted and, based on their material, quality, and condition, will go through one or more of several next-life processes:

• Resold
• Repaired and resold
• Donated
• Downcycled into an industrial product (insulation, bedding, etc.)
• Recycled into fabric or materials to be used by the fashion industry
• Recycled into fabric you can put to use in your product

Your ideal program will be driven - in large part - by the vision and goals you established in step #1 above.

As you design your initial program, remember that your brand’s desired path may not be feasible in the short term.

So, as you seek to begin, reach out to reclaiming, donations, and recycling partners to see how closely you can achieve your optimal vision now, as well as determine what the roadmap to moving towards that end vision could look like.

Examples of Tradeoffs In Launching Your Program

For example, you may envision that all received products should be repaired and resold or recycled back into fabrics your company can use to make new goods. This is a beautiful circular vision.

However, after conducting research and engaging with repair and recycling partners, you may discover that the cost structure of repair and resell is untenable for your business.

In addition, you may find that the composite nature of your fabrics makes circular recycling very difficult. In this situation, you can donate usable goods (with a nonprofit partner) and downcycle more worn goods (into insulation with a downcycling partner) as a starting point.

In parallel, you’d take on strategies to make repair and resale more feasible in the long term, potentially by building a repair platform and a recommerce site in-house or partnering with a repair and resale organization.

Additionally, you might reconsider the textiles and components you work with, prioritizing fabrics that can be more easily recycled and constructing components so they can be more easily removed.

One of the most important steps in this process is to identify the partners with whom you will work to manage the back end of your take-back program.

These partners help you responsibly resell, donate, or recycle the goods you receive. While customers may not interact with them directly, they are critical to your program’sprogram’s success.

Depending on the size and complexity of your program, you may need a partner(s) for some or all of the following:

• Partner who receives and sorts the goods that come in

• Partner who helps repair and/or resell the goods that come in

• Partner who supports any donations

• Partner downcycles your goods into industrial goods

• Partner who recycles your goods (either mechanically or chemically) into raw materials that can be sold to brands (and ideally, sold back to you for use in your products)

• Partner who supports with any items that need to be landfilled or incinerated, as inevitably, some of what you receive will be unusable and will need to be discarded
  Partner who helps track and audit data across this program

In many cases, one or two partners can handle all you need. Your brand may take some of these steps internally while outsourcing others to a partner.

If you’re unsure which partners you should work with, we can help you identify organizations aligning with your brand’s needs, goals, and values.

At this point, you can decide what goods you will take back.

For example:

• Will it be your goods, or a subset of your goods?
• Will it be all apparel, or all apparel of a certain type of material?
• How clean does the material need to be?
• Are there materials you will ban?

With your back-end strategy in place, it’s time to plan for the customer-facing elements of your take-back program.

So far, you’ve determined what items you’ll be accepting in your take-back program, what will happen to those goods, and what partners will help you bring the end-of-life portion of this program to life.

Now, it’s time to structure the front end. What do you envision for the customer experience and the operational flow?

First, if you’re still unsure about what goods you will accept, now is the time to create solid criteria. This is important not only to your operational success but also to customers' understanding and participation in your program.

You need to define elements such as the brands, types, conditions, and materials of products you will take back. Then, ensure you clearly communicate these requirements.

Once you’ve solidified your take-back requirements, you’re ready to examine the process of receiving products.

Here are some questions for you to consider:

• Will goods be mailed back, or will you have in-store drop-offs or both?
  If mailed back, will customers order a mail-back kit or use any mailer/box they have?

• Will this mail-back kit be an add-on offer to existing website orders, or can customers order it separately?

• Will you offer the mail-back kit free of charge, or will you charge a nominal amount?

• Will you include a prepaid shipping label or ask customers to cover the shipping cost?

• Will participating customers receive coupon codes, discount structures, in-store points, or other benefits?

With so many factors at play, there are countless ways to structure your program.

Here are three examples of different approaches to the operational side of take-back programs to help you visualize how these various elements can come together.

Brand X Take-Back Program

Brand Y Take-Back Program

Brand Z Take-Back Program

If you are creating a mail-back kit for your customers to order and use to send back goods at the end of their useful life, then your next step will be to design your mail-in kit packaging solution.

If you sell and are taking back soft goods, here are the standard components of a kit:

1. Mailer for the Returned Goods

Made with recycled content - learn why recycled matters.

Customers need a mailer to fill with their goods. Most brands use poly mailers rather than paper mailers for this use case because:

• They are less expensive to ship
• They can fold up for efficient shipping to customers
• They can be stuffed with a lot of products and retain durability
• They are significantly cheaper (important if brands are covering the cost)

Brands will typically brand these mailers, helping to showcase their brand messaging, create a memorable experience for their customers, and promote a collective movement towards a more circular future.

2. Notecard or Info-Sharing Sheet

Made with recycled content - learn why recycled matters.

Some brands simply print branding and instructions on the mail-back kit mailer itself. Other brands will print out a sheet or a notecard outlining specifics of the take-back program and giving customer instructions on what to send back, what not to send back, where to go for their discount code, and more.

3. Return Shipping Label

Printed on a zero-waste release liner - learn why zero waste matters.

A pre-printed FedEx, UPS, or USPS shipping label to the address your brand needs all sent-back material to go to. This is often the location of your reclaiming partner.

Generally, these labels are mass-printed in bulk, with a default dimension and weight and a brand agreement with your carrier regarding how charges will be incurred.

Because these labels are mass printed in bulk, they may or may not contain unique tracking codes and, therefore, may not be trackable depending on what carrier partner you work with and how they structure their operations.

4. Mailer to Ship the Complete Take-Back Kit

Made with a right-sized mailer - learn why sizing right matters.

The mailer for the returned goods, notecard, and return shipping label need to be sent to customers in some type of packaging.

This is where the take-back kit mailer comes in to play. This is typically a paper mailer or envelope, optimally with dimensions and a weight that keeps it at the lowest shipping cost rate possible.

Some brands print instructions, branding, or messaging on these kit mailers, while others leave them blank.

5. Coupon Code

Made with eco-friendly stickers or recycled notecards.

If brands offer a coupon code or discount to customers who send back goods, they need to figure out how to best deliver the code.

Some brands add a variable coupon code to the mailed out take-back kit as a sticker that is adhered to the kit mailer or a variably printed notecard.

Other brands skip this step, instead instituting a process for emailing customers a unique coupon code when their take-back kit arrives at the facility.

Once the mail-back kit is developed, the next step is to get it on your website or a host partner’s website.

Design the ordering experience you want customers to have, including whether they can order your kit as a stand-alone purchase or as part of an existing purchase. Then, get the ordering system online and test everything to ensure all the front- and back-end processes function properly.

Ideally, get someone else to review the ordering process and give you feedback. Did they get confused or experience friction at any point? If so, streamline things and try again.

Once you have your ordering system online, your mailing kits, and your operations in place, you’re ready to prepare for the program launch.

To make your program a success, take the time to plan a robust marketing campaign to accompany the launch. Simply adding the mail-in kit to your shop or a drop-off spot to your store isn’tisn’t enough to get customers to participate.

Instead, consider using channels such as social media, web content, email, printed materials, and more to share your new program with customers and invite them to join in.

Then it’s time to launch!

As you do, be proactively tracking critical metrics such as:

Customer Interest Rate

• How many customers have ordered the take-back kit?

• How many store drop-offs are we receiving?

• How frequently are customers adding it to their cart at checkout?

• Are participants new customers or existing customers?

• How does the program impact customer loyalty, reorder rates, etc.?

Participation Rate

• How many kits do you get back?

• What % of customers who order a kit use it and send products back?

• What % of coupon codes are used?

Recycling Rate

• How many pounds of product is being received?

• How does it split into your brand’s goods versus others?

• What % is contamination?

• What % is resold, donated, downcycled, recycled?

• What % is recycled back into your goods?

• What % needs to be landfilled?

Financials

• How much does the program cost - end to end?

• What are the per-unit costs versus overarching expenses?

• Is the program generating any positive impact on your revenue?

Overall Sustainability

• Lbs of landfill diversion

• Lbs of carbon and water saved from recycling textiles into usable goods

• Number of new products made with recycled materials from the program

• Products donated

Your take-back program will not be perfect initially, and that’s okay.

Keep iterating and improving it, keeping your ultimate vision and goals in mind. It may take time, but you’ll learn more with every iteration and make progress toward greater circularity and sustainability.

EcoEnclose has supported several brands as they launched and operated their take-back programs. We are positioned to bring your mail-back kit to market rapidly.

If you are already purchasing your packaging with EcoEnclose and plan to produce mail-back kits in batches of 10,000 or more, we can execute the following:

1. Design & brand your return mailer

We produce the mailer your customers use to send back their products.

Depending on your volumes, these can be printed with a variable design to allow for variable barcode scanning or variable QR code needs at the receiving end of your operational process.

2. Print your return labels

We print shipping labels on our unique Zero Waste Shipping Labels.

While EcoEnclose can mass print these labels, they will be done on your brand’s carrier accounts - UPS, USPS, FedEx, etc. Often, specific agreements must be put in place with your carrier to ensure the rates incurred for these send-back shipments are competitive.

3. Print your stickers & notecards

We print any variable stickers or notecards you need for variable coupon codes or similar use cases.

4. Design & custom brand your mail-back kit mailer

We produce the outer mailer that your mail-back kit will be shipped to your customers in.

5. Keep your shipping costs low

It's critical to keep weight and dimensions of the take-back kit to a minimum. We help you design all of your components in such a way that your cost of shipping is as low as possible.

6. Kitting your mail-back kits

We kit the mail-back components into a single package.

7. Ship your mail-back kits

We ship fully formed mail-back kits to your fulfillment center or your required location.

Our team of sustainable packaging experts are ready to assist.