The post-holiday returns surge carries environmental and financial costs: the National Retail Federation expects about 17% of holiday purchases to be returned, and returns can raise an item’s footprint by 25%–30%. Roughly one-third of returns aren’t resold and may end up in landfills. Consumers can reduce impact by returning items promptly, reusing packaging, preferring in-store purchases or gift cards, and avoiding ordering multiple sizes. Retailers are using technology and policy changes to limit waste.
Don't Let Holiday Returns End Up In A Landfill — Practical Steps To Cut Waste And Emissions
Your holiday gift returns might go to a landfill. Here’s what you can do about it
The holiday season is winding down, but retailers are entering their busiest period for returns — and those returns have real environmental and financial costs. The National Retail Federation expects roughly 17 percent of holiday purchases to be returned this year, and experts warn that many of those items could generate significantly more emissions or even end up in landfills.
Why Returns Spike After Holidays
Buying gifts for others often involves guesswork, and online shopping makes it harder to judge fit, color and quality from photos. Apparel and footwear, where fit matters most, regularly produce the highest return rates. Retailers have extended return windows and added seasonal staff to manage the influx.
Environmental And Financial Costs
Most consumer products arrive packaged in plastic, which is derived from oil and entails greenhouse-gas emissions during production. If an item is shipped to you and then returned, many of those steps — packaging, transport and handling — occur a second time. Worcester Polytechnic Institute supply-chain professor Joseph Sarkis estimates a returned item can raise its environmental impact by about 25%–30%.
What Happens To Returned Items?
When retailers receive returns they may route them to refurbishers, liquidators or recyclers — or, in many cases, to a landfill. About one in three returned items never finds a new buyer because it’s not worth reselling. High-value electronics often go to secondary markets, but low-cost goods (for example, a $6 silicone spatula) typically don’t justify the expense of inspection and refurbishment. Intimate items such as bathing suits and bras are also harder to resell for hygiene and perception reasons.
“It can be quite expensive. And if you send it out to a new customer and the phone is bad, imagine the reputational hit you’ll get. So the companies are hesitant to take that chance.”
What Shoppers Can Do
Consumers can take several practical steps to reduce waste and improve the odds that a returned item is resold:
- Return items promptly. Seasonal merchandise returned quickly (e.g., Dec. 20 vs. Jan. 5) is far more likely to be restocked and resold.
- Avoid damage and reuse original packaging. That increases the product’s resale value and reduces repackaging needs.
- Prefer in-store shopping when possible. Purchases made and returned in person are less likely to be returned, and in-store returns are often restocked faster, reducing transport distances and emissions.
- Consider gift cards. They remove guessing and substantially lower the chance of returns.
- Avoid “bracketing.” Ordering multiple sizes to try at home increases returns and related emissions.
How Retailers And Technology Can Help
Retailers are experimenting with ways to limit waste from returns. Some are charging for certain returns to discourage casual or unnecessary ones; Amazon has already implemented charges in specific situations. Others are investing in smarter return-management systems. Blue Yonder’s acquisition of Optoro, for example, provides software that quickly assesses returned items and routes them to the stores most likely to resell them.
“Having that process be more digitized, you can quickly assess the condition and put it back into inventory. So that’s a big way to just avoid landfill and also all of the carbon emissions that are associated with that.”
Longer-Term Fixes
Clothing generates the largest share of returns in part because size labels are inconsistent across brands. Better sizing standards, detailed measurements, 3D imaging and virtual-reality try-on tools could help shoppers choose correctly and cut return rates. Greater transparency from retailers about the environmental and cost impacts of returns could also nudge consumer behavior, though companies may be reluctant to highlight negative effects in product listings.
Bottom Line
Minimizing unnecessary returns — by choosing in-person shopping when practical, reusing packaging, returning quickly, and choosing gift cards for uncertain recipients — helps reduce landfill waste, lower emissions and curb the hidden costs baked into retail prices.
