Reuse Without Uniformity: The Digital System Behind Cosmetics Returns
Reuse in cosmetics presents a particular design problem. The operational system benefits from standardisation, but cosmetics packaging creates value through distinctive shapes, proportions and shelf presence. A workable model has to accommodate both.
In a FACHPACK TV interview for packaging journal, Steffanie Rainer of reo and Felix Gass of PSL discussed how a digital return platform could bring brand-specific cosmetics packs into a shared reuse system. The conversation covered the origins of the model, the role of reverse-vending infrastructure, retailer incentives, environmental evidence and the practical challenge of scaling a multi-partner network.
The full 21-minute interview is available in German via packaging journal and Vimeo.
The starting point: refill stations that would not scale
The project did not begin with a return platform. It began with refill stations. Early prototypes were built with an engineering mindset, but several barriers quickly became visible. Brands were reluctant to supply products in large bulk formats, hygiene requirements were complex, and consumer adoption was uncertain.
The useful asset was not the physical station itself. It was the digital layer developed around it: identification, data collection and the ability to follow an individual pack through a system. The team changed direction and began building a platform that could connect return, sorting, cleaning, reuse and eventual recycling.
This pivot illustrates a wider principle in packaging innovation. A pilot should not be judged only by whether its first format scales. It should also reveal which capability has the greatest system value. In this case, that capability was traceability.
Brand individuality is a system requirement
Beverage reuse often relies on highly standardised bottle pools. Cosmetics works differently. A shampoo bottle, skin-care jar or personal-care pack is part of the brand experience. Replacing every format with one standard container may simplify operations, but it can remove an important source of differentiation.
The alternative is not unlimited variation. It is controlled compatibility. Shared specifications can be created for the interfaces that determine system performance: openings, shoulders, radii, materials, label behaviour, inspection criteria and cleaning processes. Packs can retain distinctive forms while operating within boundaries that make automated handling possible.
Digital identification supports this model. A code can tell the system which brand owns a pack, how it should be sorted, which cleaning route it needs and how many cycles it has completed. Standardise the operational language, not necessarily every visible pack.
Reuse requires the whole value chain
A linear packaging model allows each participant to optimise its own step. A reuse model creates dependencies across the entire loop. Brands, retailers, packaging manufacturers, return-system operators, logistics partners, cleaners and recyclers all need to exchange information and coordinate decisions.
That coordination is one of the largest barriers to change. The beginning of the value chain has not traditionally needed to communicate with the end of it. Reuse changes that relationship. A packaging decision made during design affects machine acceptance, transport density, cleaning, quality assurance and the economics of every later rotation.
The platform is therefore not simply software placed on top of a container. It is an operating model that gives the participants a shared view of the pack and the process around it.
Use the infrastructure consumers already understand
The strongest return journey is usually one that fits into an existing routine. In Germany, consumers already take beverage containers back to supermarkets. Reverse-vending machines are familiar, widely distributed and connected to an established incentive system.
The reo concept asks whether this infrastructure can also accept cosmetics packaging. At the time of the FACHPACK conversation, a Munich pilot was being prepared for launch on 30 October with cosmetics brands including Kneipp, lavera, SANTE and LOGONA. The goal was to learn how existing packs behave in a return system before assuming that every format has to be redesigned.
The model also separates the point of purchase from the point of return. A product bought online could be returned during a normal supermarket visit. That matters because requiring consumers to package and ship individual empty bottles back to a brand creates friction that few reuse systems can afford.
The retailer needs a simple operating model
Consumer convenience cannot be achieved by transferring complexity to the retailer. Store teams need a process that is easy to understand, space-efficient and compatible with existing operations.
The proposed system uses one collection container for the participating cosmetics packs. Retail employees do not have to sort the individual formats in the back room; automated identification and downstream sorting take over that work. The return stream can also be separated from food-contact beverage material so that the packs remain intact without disrupting the established beverage process.
The commercial model matters too. Retailers receive compensation for accepted packs. They may also benefit when customers redeem a deposit or voucher in store. A return point becomes more attractive when it creates both a sustainability service and a reason to visit.
Data turns a pilot into a decision system
Brands often lack reliable information about what happens after packaging leaves the shelf. Return rates, achieved rotations, loss points, cleaning performance and consumer behaviour are assumptions rather than measured facts.
A digitally identified pack creates evidence across the loop. The pilot can show which formats return, where they are accepted, how they survive handling, what cleaning inputs they require and when material quality begins to deteriorate. Consumer feedback and operational data can then be combined with an independent environmental assessment.
This transparency supports better investment decisions. It also gives brands a stronger basis for environmental communication. As scrutiny of green claims increases, a reuse proposition needs measured outcomes rather than a general promise that reuse must be better.
Design for evidence, not an arbitrary cycle count
One of the most important questions in reuse design is how durable a pack should be. Designing for 200 cycles sounds ambitious, but it may add unnecessary material if the real system achieves only a small fraction of that number.
The relevant target is the number of rotations required to deliver a credible environmental advantage under realistic return, transport and cleaning conditions. That point may be reached after relatively few cycles for some formats and much later for others. The answer depends on material, geometry, product residue, cleaning intensity, transport distance and loss rate.
The pilot was therefore being accompanied by Fraunhofer expertise to evaluate environmental performance and determine what changes were actually necessary. The question was not simply how to make every pack heavier. It was how to make each pack sufficiently robust for the system it could realistically complete.
Regulation can unlock cross-border infrastructure
Large brands rarely want a packaging solution that works in only one national market. A model that depends entirely on Germany's existing deposit network would struggle to justify changes to a European packaging portfolio.
The expansion of deposit-return infrastructure in countries such as Austria and Romania creates a different possibility. As more markets build reverse-vending networks, the physical basis for broader return models becomes available. Regulation does not create a cosmetics reuse system by itself, but it can reduce one of the largest infrastructure barriers.
That makes interoperability increasingly important. A shared digital and operational model should be able to work across regions even when collection partners, logistics and machine networks differ.
Scale in phases
A platform model faces a familiar network challenge: brands need return points, retailers need participating products and consumers need enough convenient locations to adopt the behaviour. These elements cannot appear everywhere at once.
The practical response is a phased rollout. Begin with committed brands and retail partners, establish the operational baseline, measure performance and improve the system before expanding geographically. Different packaging types will progress at different speeds because glass, plastics, closures and product residues do not create identical cleaning and handling requirements.
This is not a weakness of the model. It is a way to manage uncertainty. Each phase should reduce the questions that the next investment decision has to carry.
Persistence is part of the infrastructure
System innovation moves more slowly than an individual packaging redesign because it asks multiple organisations to change together. The conversation closed on the personal qualities required to keep that process moving. Persistence came first: staying with the vision while brands, retailers and technical partners learn at different speeds.
The second quality was curiosity. Packaging development has spent decades improving speed, weight and performance within existing linear systems. A digital reuse platform changes the unit of innovation. The task is no longer only to optimise one bottle, but to connect many packs, partners and markets into a functioning loop.
A practical blueprint for a cosmetics return pilot
Test the existing portfolio first. Use real packs to identify acceptance, handling and cleaning constraints before redesigning everything.
Define shared interfaces. Standardise the physical and digital characteristics the system needs while preserving useful brand distinction.
Build on familiar return behaviour. Place collection within journeys consumers already make.
Remove store-level sorting. Make the retail process simple and move identification downstream.
Track every relevant step. Connect return, logistics, cleaning, inspection, rotation and recycling data.
Validate the environmental threshold. Determine how many realistic rotations are needed, rather than selecting an arbitrary durability target.
Give each participant a reason to join. Design operational and commercial value for brands, retailers and consumers.
Expand by compatible regions and formats. Use evidence from each phase to guide the next one.
Key takeaways
Cosmetics reuse must balance shared operational rules with brand-specific packaging.
The digital identity of a pack can connect sorting, cleaning, ownership and rotation data.
Existing reverse-vending infrastructure can make returns convenient and support expansion beyond one market.
Retail participation depends on a simple collection process and a viable incentive.
Environmental performance should be measured using achieved rotations and real system inputs.
A phased platform rollout turns uncertainty into evidence without waiting for a perfect system.
The larger opportunity is not to make one cosmetics bottle reusable. It is to create the shared infrastructure that allows many different packs to return, be understood and move through the right next step.
For brands exploring returns, PSL connects reuse opportunity assessment with packaging development for the full return loop, from filling and dispensing to washing and repeated use.