Vacation buying was anticipated to interrupt information in 2021 — and now that each one the presents have been unwrapped, the returns are flooding in.
UPS estimates that it’ll course of greater than 60 million return packages by the top of January, 10% greater than final yr. However not all returned merchandise shall be restocked and resold. As an alternative, many will find yourself getting thrown away.
Returned stock accounted for five.8 billion kilos of landfill waste in 2020, in accordance with reverse logistics firm Optoro and Environmental Capital Group. This occurs primarily as a result of processing returns, particularly e-commerce returns, is time-consuming and labor- and resource-intensive, Meagan Knowlton, Optoro’s director of sustainability, instructed Insider.
