Recycling isn’t just about putting a blue bin in the staff room, it’s becoming a secret weapon for success. Whether you’re a local salon, a growing brand, or a shop on the high street, being eco-friendly can make businesses more resilient and profitable. Here’s how the industry is turning “waste” into a win-win.

Saving Money

Let’s be honest, business costs in the UK are high. But did you know that throwing things away is also getting more expensive so here’s how you can save.

• Lower bin bills: Councils and waste companies charge by how much your bin weighs. By recycling heavy hair, metal foils, and glass through specialist programs, salons are making their “general waste” bins lighter—and their monthly bills smaller.
• The Plastic Tax: The UK government now charges a heavy tax on plastic packaging that isn’t made from recycled materials. Brands that use recycled plastic save thousands of pounds in fees.
• Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR): Under the 2026 EPR rules, UK brands are financially responsible for the full cost of managing their packaging waste.

Happy Customers, Busy Shops

UK shoppers are savvy. They want to buy from people who care.

• The reward loop: offering points or a discount for planet positive customer behaviour, such as returning used empties is not only great for the environment, but it’s good for business because it guarantees that the customer comes back to your store to spend their reward.

• The feel-good factor: A salon that recycles hair to help clean up oil spills has a much better story to tell than one that just sends it to a landfill. It builds a bond with clients that a discount code simply can’t match.

A Little Extra in the Till

Many UK salons have introduced a “green fee.” It’s usually just an extra £1 added to the bill to cover the cost of eco-friendly disposal. Clients rarely mind—they actually feel good about contributing. For a busy salon, this doesn’t just cover the recycling costs; it often creates a small “green fund” that can be used to improve the business.

Keeping the Best Team

Finding and keeping great staff is one of the biggest challenges in beauty. Today’s stylists and graduates want to work for a company they are proud of. A business that takes its environmental impact seriously is much more likely to keep its best people, saving money on recruitment and training.

The bottom line is this: recycling in the beauty industry is no longer just a ‘nice to do’ chore. New regulations and specialised services have made it significantly more expensive to ignore waste than to manage it. Recycling is a way to reduce your bills and keep customers coming back.

Here’s our guide to some of the most prominent recycling programmes to know and use right now:

MYGroup – MYGroup provides zero-landfill solutions for a wide range of waste types, including plastics, textiles, food and clinical waste. Its services include secure waste destruction, bioconversion and eco-manufacturing.

Biffa – Biffa helps businesses reuse, recycle and repurpose materials that are no longer needed.

Business Waste – Business Waste collects any type of waste from any location in the UK.

Full Circle – Full Circle helps salons and barbers recycle hair, paper, metal, foil and plastics.

Green Salon Directive – Green Salon Collective provides hair and metal waste recycling solutions for the hair and beauty industry. They recently partnered with Craft, the British Hairdressing Business Awards’ Sustainable Salon of the Year.

Remi Cachet – Remi Cachet collaborate with two charities – Little Lady Locks and Matter of Trust – to recycle and reuse human hair extensions.

HANDLE – HANDLE collects beauty packaging from salons, stores and beauty brands and sorts it into waste streams for onward recycling or use in our own in-house manufacturing of products and accessories.

Planet Friendly Paint  – Planet Friendly Paint offers an innovative circular economy solution to the cosmetic waste problem.

Suez – Suez provides waste collection and recycling services.

Matter of Trust – Matter of Trust mobilises interwoven, replicable, local-to-global systems that sort waste into resources.

Recycle My Salon – Recycle My Salon recycles human hair and aluminium products from salons and freelancers.

TerraCycle – TerraCycle provides ‘zero-waste boxes’ to help keep rubbish out of landfills and incinerators.