Case study.
Developing a good quality
customer recycling system,
while keeping customers
engaged.
McDonald’s UK
June 2015
Developing a good quality customer recycling system, while keeping customers
engaged. | 2
Contents
1
Working to meet legislative requirements
3
2
Developing kitchen procedures
3
3
Developing kitchen procedures
3
4
Testing & Results
5
4.1
Test 1, March 2013 – June 2013: Glasgow: Trongate, Argyle Street, Linwood
5
4.2
Test 2, December 2013 – June 2014: Glasgow: Trongate, Argyle Street, Linwood6
5
Analysis & Customer research
7
6
A solution
8
7
Conclusion
9
1
Working to meet legislative requirements
McDonald’s UK’s waste strategy is to send zero waste to landfill by reducing operational
waste, recycling as much as possible and diverting the remainder to a more sustainable
solution.
The company’s ambition is to recycle a minimum of 50% of its waste to a high quality, and
divert the remainder from landfill, while fully complying with all relevant legislation and
ensuring customer engagement.
To achieve this, McDonald’s UK has been liaising with the Scottish Environment Protection
Agency (SEPA) since 2013, to work towards compliance with The Waste (Scotland)
Regulations 2012 across its 95 Scottish restaurants.
The legislation requires that from 1st January 2014, waste producers in Scotland “take all
reasonable steps” to ensure the separate collection of dry recyclable waste and food waste
produced by businesses.
2
Developing kitchen procedures
McDonald’s quickly developed a solution for kitchen waste (‘Back of House’), which
constitutes 52% of the company’s total waste.
The company’s restaurants across the UK already recycled cardboard, used cooking oil,
kitchen food waste and used uniforms using a ‘backhauling’ system through which these
items were collected by delivery trucks and taken back to a distribution centres for
recycling.
Under new procedures introduced to comply with the legislation, additional materials,
including clean plastic and paper packaging, were identified for dry mixed recycling
collections, and dedicated bins provided for food waste recycling at an anaerobic digestion
(AD) plant.
These procedures were verified with SEPA to ensure that restaurants would be legislatively
compliant for back of house waste by 1st January 2014.
Procedures for kitchen food separation and collection were trialled for six months from
March to September 2013, and kitchen recycling collections were trialled from July to
September 2013.
All Scottish restaurants were then trained on the procedures, and implementation in
Scotland began in October 2013, with the England, Wales and Northern Ireland following in
April 2014.
3
Developing kitchen procedures
McDonald’s quickly developed a solution for kitchen waste (‘Back of House’), which
constitutes 52% of the company’s total waste.
The company’s restaurants across the UK already recycled cardboard, used cooking oil,
kitchen food waste and used uniforms using a ‘backhauling’ system through which these
items were collected by delivery trucks and taken back to a distribution centres for
recycling.
Under new procedures introduced to comply with the legislation, additional materials,
including clean plastic and paper packaging, were identified for dry mixed recycling
collections, and dedicated bins provided for food waste recycling at an anaerobic digestion
(AD) plant.
These procedures were verified with SEPA to ensure that restaurants would be legislatively
compliant for back of house waste by 1st January 2014.
Procedures for kitchen food separation and collection were trialled for six months from
March to September 2013, and kitchen recycling collections were trialled from July to
September 2013.
All Scottish restaurants were then trained on the procedures, and implementation in
Scotland began in October 2013, with the England, Wales and Northern Ireland following in
April 2014.
This included:

Composition analysis, to identify what types of waste are being generated Front of
House and in what quantities. Some more detailed analysis on Front of House waste
was also commissioned from the consultancy SWR, to engage with a number of
different Scottish waste management companies to assess the recyclability of post
customer packaging.

Research on best practice, looking to see what solutions already existed for
consumer separation, and which elements were most successful in various
McDonald’s markets across Europe, and also within other businesses in Scotland.

Testing various potential solutions in three restaurants across Glasgow:
Trongate, Argyle Street, and Linwood. Using the Front of House composition analysis
and the feedback from waste management companies in the SWR report, a set of
guidelines was formulated to test different solutions, and set up a series of tests in
three restaurants in Glasgow. Each test looked at a different separation model, to
compare and contrast the ability of customers to separate various waste streams.
The testing was run twice, with the second series of tests designed to refine the
solutions on the basis of the first tests’ findings.

Customer research was conducted once trials were in place for several months, to
assess customer feedback on the various separation models.
McDonald’s continued to meet SEPA regularly throughout the process in order to update on
progress and receive guidance on the direction of our research.
4
4.1
Testing & Results
Test 1, March 2013 – June 2013: Glasgow: Trongate, Argyle
Street, Linwood
Based on the findings from the research and analysis we embarked on the first trial in three
restaurants in the Glasgow area, testing different steams in each store:
Figure 1: Customer separation testing, Test 1
Combined with the analysis, this research showed that food waste was not a successful
option for recycling. However, it led us to consider increasing the number of recycling
options. Whilst we had focused on three as a maximum, we found that if plastic was not
offered, along with paper cups and liquid, customers were more confused.
The results from the first test showed very poor levels of separation in both Linwood and
Trongate, with too much plastic (16%) on the compostable side to send to AD, and too
much food (15%) on the plastic side to be sent for recycling. All packaging ended up going
to general waste.
Customers also got frustrated at not being able to put all of their waste into one bin due to
the divider, and often left their trays on tables rather than trying to recycle. They also found
the messaging confusing.
The simpler option in Argyle Street, with only liquid and cup separation was well received by
customers and staff. Cups were separated with little other contamination, and removal of
liquid reduced the weight of the general waste.
4.2
Test 2, December 2013 – June 2014: Glasgow: Trongate, Argyle
Street, Linwood
The second trial took lessons from the first, including liquid, cups, and a section for ‘all
other waste’. The bin was re-designed in order to try and keep the recycling fractions within
the current footprint to help us deploy a solution in each restaurant, maintaining the décor
of the restaurant and not impacting on space.
For this test we also reviewed the possibility of removing plastic cups instead of paper in
one restaurant, and adding these to the mixed recycling stream from the kitchen. Whilst we
learnt, through these in-store trials and in-depth customer research commissioned from an
independent market research consultancy (see more below), that three fractions was the
maximum for customers to separate, we wanted to test food waste separation again, but
without packaging to see if this was more successful. We trialled this in two restaurants,
with a comparison against plastic collection in the third.
Figure 2: Customer separation testing, Test 2
This configuration also produced some frustration for customers and staff, with mixed
results in terms of separation. All sections were contaminated to some degree, but the food
section contained the highest amount of ‘other’ materials. However, paper cups were easy
for staff to manage, and the easiest stream for customers to separate.
Moving the recycling from the side of the bin to the front appeared to make the option to
recycle less of a choice – this resulted in customers standing by the bin for longer to try and
understand how to comply, or leaving their trays for staff to clear rather than using the
‘catch all’ general waste section as they would normally.
The number of different sections impacted staff time in terms of changing the bins and the
test had to be removed from Linwood as a result, but continued in the other two restaurants
whilst the waste composition was analysed.
5
Analysis & Customer research
Analysis was conducted by Veolia when the second recycling trial had been in place for four
months.
When analysing the content of the customer bins the Veolia team captured the kg weight of
the correct materials in each bin and the kg weight of the incorrect material in each bin to
assess the success of the customer segregation process.
In the table below the analysis shows the differences between Trongate (separating liquid,
paper cups and food) and Argyle Street (separating liquid, paper cups and plastic).
Both restaurants showed successful capture and separation of cups and liquid, but
considerable differences could be seen between food and plastic.
Figure 3: Tables to show waste analysis in McDonald’s Trongate and Argyle Street during
the customer separation test 2.
The capture rate of food waste in Trongate was far lower than the capture rate of plastic in
Argyle Street, and the contamination of food was far greater.
In terms of recycling rate, the plastic separation was far more successful, despite the fact
that there was slightly more food waste than plastic.
Where plastic was separated, there was also a higher capture rate of cups.
It is clear that the plastic was much easier to separate than food, a fact supported by the
customer research conducted during the test.
Customer research, undertaken by an independent consultancy, Red Onion Research, found
that separation of food waste was universally disliked by customers – it felt deeply
unsanitary, and there was a real distaste for handling left over food from their meal.
It also found that the best quality recycling will best be achieved by a simple and instinctive
solution.
Combined with the analysis, this research showed that food waste was not a successful
option for recycling. However, it led McDonald’s to consider increasing the number of
recycling options. Whilst it had focused on three streams as a maximum, these finding
suggested that if plastic was not offered, along with paper cups and liquid, customers were
more confused.
Customers were also very clear that they wanted a larger area for recycling, so that they
had space to put their tray down and sort out their packaging without feeling rushed.
6
A solution
Following 18 months of the research, testing, analysis and customer feedback outlined
above, McDonald’s developed a solution that it is confident will generate the highest levels
of separation and good quality customer recycling.
That solution is a larger unit and consists of the following separation fractions:




Liquid: all the waste management facilities approached by SWR recommended that
liquid waste should be removed at source, and customers reported that liquid sinks
felt familiar, and echoed behaviour they are used to at home.
o Disposal: Liquid is largely water, and will be poured down the drain.
Paper cups: SWR found that paper cups constitute the greatest proportion of the
volume of total waste. Customers can see that a lot of them are used and that
recycling them would have a demonstrable impact.
o Recycling: Based on the recommendation from SWR, we have found a
specialist recycler for paper cups and intend to add them to the backhauling
process in order to ensure that they can be recycled back into a high grade
paper product.
Plastic: Customers expect us to recycle plastic, as this is seen as a big
environmental issue.
o Recycling: The plastic from Front of House will be added to the dry mixed
recycling from Back of House and collected by waste contractors to be
processed at the recycling facility.
Other: Food and all other packaging/ waste will be collected together as general
waste
o Disposal: This will be collected by waste contractors as part of the residual
waste stream. We will work with the waste contractors to ensure that it is
diverted from landfill to energy recovery facilities wherever possible.
Figure 4: The final solution that will be rolled out across Scotland. The functionality will
remain the same as shown here, but the graphics are being developed to match restaurant
décor.
7
Conclusion
After 18 months of research, waste composition analysis, in-store trials and customer
research, McDonald’s identified a solution that is easy for customers to follow while
generating the greatest amount of recyclable material.
The new customer recycling station, the first of its kind for McDonald’s UK, will be rolled-out
in all McDonald’s restaurants across Scotland by the end of 2015, allowing customers to
separate paper cups, plastic bottles, and decant liquids. With good levels of customer
separation, McDonald's new waste procedures could generate a recycling rate of up to 65%
in Scottish restaurants.
McDonald’s in Scotland
There are 95 McDonald’s restaurants in Scotland, of which 38 are company run, and
57 owned by 13 franchisees. There are 95 McDonald’s restaurants in Scotland, of
which 38 are company run, and 57 owned by 13 franchisees.
Franchisees operate as local businesses within their communities and get involved
with local activities such as football sponsorship as part of our Community
Partnership with the Scottish FA, and community clean up events, often in
partnership with Keep Scotland Beautiful.
McDonald’s contributes to Scotland’s economy through job creation and skills
training, employing over 6,900 people across Scotland. All our employees have
access to training, including opportunities to study for Apprenticeship and
Foundation Degree qualifications.
The business supports a further 2,200 jobs indirectly, through our supply chain,
including at major suppliers such as Smith Anderson in Kirkcaldy which supplies all
our paper bags across the UK, Arla Foods in Dumfries and Galloway, and Pacific
Building Ltd, a construction firm in Glasgow.
Recent independent research commissioned by McDonald’s and undertaken by
Development Economics has shown that McDonald’s and its suppliers make a
combined annual contribution of around £170 million to the Scottish economy.