Navigating Global Sustainability with Lydia Geddes of Lorax EPI

In this episode, Cory Connors speaks with Lydia Geddes from Lorax EPI about how her team helps companies navigate Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) globally. Lydia shares her personal journey from sociology graduate to EPR expert, the evolution of Lorax EPI, and why data management is the cornerstone of compliance. They discuss the rapid changes in EPR legislation, the challenges businesses face, and why Lorax EPI’s hands-on approach beats AI-powered shortcuts.

Key Topics Discussed:

• Lydia’s career path and how COVID reshaped her trajectory
• What Lorax EPI does and why it’s a global leader in EPR compliance
• The complexity of EPR reporting and why data is king
• How Lorax EPI supports businesses with last-minute compliance needs
• The rise of EPR in North America and its impact on global brands
• Why AI tools fall short for nuanced EPR legislation
• Lorax EPI’s growth, global footprint, and commitment to client collaboration
• Future trends: Will EPR ever be standardized worldwide?
• Practical advice for companies starting their EPR journey
  
  

Resources Mentioned:

• Lorax EPI website: loraxcompliance.com
• Lorax EPI LinkedIn page
• Circular Action Alliance webinars

Contact:
Reach out to Lydia and her team:

Email: lgeddes@loraxcompliance.com
Info: info@loraxcompliance.com
Website: loraxcompliance.com

Closing Thoughts:

Lydia emphasizes that EPR is here to stay—and it’s only getting more complex. Businesses that act now to gather comprehensive data and partner with experts will be better prepared for the future. Lorax EPI’s combination of technology and human expertise makes them an invaluable resource for companies navigating this fast-changing landscape.

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Transcript

Speaker: 0:07

Welcome to Sustainable Packaging with Cory Connors presented by Atlantic Packaging. I'm your host, Cory Connors. In today's episode, I connected with Lydia Geddes from Lorax EPI, all the way from Rugby England. We got to talk about how they are helping companies navigate extended producer responsibility globally and more. I'd also like to thank our sponsors, 3M, Specright, and Lorax EPI. We couldn't do the show without them. Welcome my very good friend, Lydia Geddes, all the way from the UK, from our uh great partner, Lorax EPI. I'm so excited to have you on the show. Welcome, Lydia. Thank you. I am so honoured to be on here. You've had some fantastic people. yeah, very, very pleased to be here. Well, you're in good company and I think you, you've been doing some great things at lower XCPI. It's an incredibly innovative company and you're one of the leaders in, uh, extended producer responsibility reporting and data management and all those things that are, people are really nervous about, because the laws continue to change daily, we all know globally. but Before we get into all the cool things that Lorax EPI does and you do, let's talk about your background. How growing up in England in a small community there kind of prepared you for this kind of a role. Well, I would say I didn't really, I'd never worked in the environment industry before. I went to school in my local town, Rugby. I went to an all girls grammar school just a few years after Michelle went to the same school, my manager. So that was an interesting environment, obviously going into a all girls school, less distractions, I suppose, but maybe some other challenges, but it was a great. great schooling. I did my GCSEs and A levels which is the kind of the route here and then I went over to Warwick University to do sociology and gender studies. really interesting degree didn't lead me to any career at all so I kind of jumped out and uh just tried to find a job as most graduates do and ended up working in recruitment, ended up there for kind of 10-12 years. then went to do, went to be a wedding coordinator. Had a real, a real through, real 180. It was the natural progression clearly. I'm quite creative, so it was a, it was a good, a good route for me. But then, like COVID hit, so. There was no need for wedding coordinators when you couldn't have a wedding. I was, I didn't have a job then and then happened to come across Lorax who were in my hometown looking for customer account managers, which is a role I'd done before. And it sounded like a really interesting, really interesting place. I had young kids, so kind of environment was kind of the back of my mind always. So it just seemed to, to fit really well. So yeah, started, that was five years ago. Wow. It's incredible how COVID has changed the trajectory for so many people. And frankly, the whole world really just kind of had a reset and it's fascinating to hear kind of there's a pre COVID and then a post COVID life that most people have. And I think I wouldn't have this podcast if it wasn't for that, you know, global issue that we dealt with. And, uh you, yeah. working life, didn't it? I think things look so much different now. I mean, I think I didn't even, had never had a Microsoft Teams account or anything. didn't, I'd never done a video call before I started. Obviously there was video calls on your phone, but it was kind of very alien in a work environment. So it's been great. And I think it really does give us the opportunity. I mean, we work with people all around the world. So. It's nice to be able to see the whites of their eyes and it's not just picking up a phone all the time. So I do think this benefits. global economy and what you're doing is such a global issue. Let's talk about Lorax EPI. What is it? What do you do there? Why are you and how did you become one of the leaders in the industry? So we have worked within product stewardship for the last 11 years. Our co-founders, Michelle and Dave, had worked within regulatory and kind of software for a very long time before that and set up on their own. So really to become an absolute subject matter expert on extended producer responsibility, product stewardship, but doing it from a... doing it from a tech point of view and also doing it from a global point of view. So we have worked m out of our rugby office since then. We've moved a couple of times and we uh merged with a business called EPI who are American based and had worked again within kind of regulatory for a long time prior to the acquisition. so we now service customers globally on reporting, so actually doing the extended producing responsibility reporting through our software platform. So we are pulling in data from lots of different systems within every client's database to be able to then produce those reports. But we also kind of go that step further and we enable companies to understand what legislation is. what is enacted globally, what's changing, what's coming, what's passed, what's failed, but then also how it applies to them because I think it's such a complicated field and it's changing so often and also the biggest challenge is knowing how that applies to you as a business and that's the piece that we try and cover the whole piece so we can really work with businesses right from the start of their kind of compliance, I hate the word journey, but journey. and then kind of carry them all the way through to kind of established reporting and then looking at that kind of ongoing piece around what do they do from here, what do they focus on. And you've had some great success. You've had some great growth recently. I think it has a lot to do with the way that you work with your clients and the way that you handle there. You make it so it's not easy, but it's so much simpler, so much easier than it used to be for them. I think that's a, we certainly need to commend you for that. I think it's absolute collaboration with the clients though. think we work with such a broad spectrum of businesses and some businesses we go into and they've got dedicated sustainability teams and they've got a product design and operations. Everybody is involved in it and it really, we become embedded within that whole. Like an ecosystem. Yeah. embedded within that complete team. Others are coming to us and it's the kind of hot potato that nobody wants in the business and everybody's trying to passing it on and nobody, nobody can manage it. And then we also then take off, we become that team for them. So I think it's changed over the years of what what's been needed and, and, I think because we manage everything ourselves and we create that report ourselves and we we've created this software platform, we can be quite adaptive. We've not got anybody else we're answering to. We're just the data geeks that are making things that our clients need. Well, what an important and valuable team to have added to your customers group. You're exactly right. A lot of people didn't know what to do with extended producer responsibility. know, where does this fall? this a marketing issue? Is it a operations issue? It was a challenge. And now people have extended producer responsibility, dedicated teams or people in their companies. which is new job, you know, sustainability manager, sustainability director. These people that you're working with are, oftentimes didn't work at that company a year before or worked in a different, uh, aspect of the company. So I think that's really insightful that you're saying, you know, this is a new thing. This is something different that, that we've talked about, but I did want to talk about kind of how the landscape has changed in extended producer responsibility over the last year. Things are totally different today than they were a month ago. Absolutely. I think we've seen obviously the most amount of change in North America. We've had the introduction of EPR and we've done reports now in Oregon and Colorado and California with four more states due in May. So that's been fantastic to see it go across the pond because I think we... been talked about for such a long period of time and it's great to see it established. And we've got things like the Canadian Federal Plastics Registry which is a completely new style of report where we're companies are needing to report on not only the packaging they're placing on the market but also the plastic that is in the product and actually how much total plastics coming on. So I think there's lots of change but with that change it's been complicated for clients. mean we historically have always worked with businesses that tend to sell lots of products into lots of different markets. In Europe, EPR is not new, but the complexity is growing. And now we're also working with so many more US-based businesses because of this new legislation. is something companies didn't need to think about the total materials that they were placing on the market and how the data was broken up before. now, we're having to really establish that knowledge with customers because this is new and it's constantly evolving and um as you said at the beginning, it changes every day, every week, every month. yeah, it's fast moving and it's absolutely exciting industry to be in at the moment and I'm sure in another two years time it's going to look completely different. yeah, I think we're all job secure for a while. Well, you're exactly right. And I think it's an important point that you're making that you've been doing this in England for a long time and, and Europe and even Canada and other, other places have around the world have been doing this for many years, sometimes even decades. And, here in the North America, we're saying, wait, what is this? You know, and, you and I and Michelle and all your team have been talking about this for years and years. Uh, at events and different things and companies are saying, Oh, well, we'll deal with that when it comes. And, and now the answer is right. Right. That's exactly right. They would say, Oh, that's never going to work. Those laws will never pass. And, I think that was a, a short-sighted view and what you've done with your team has allowed them to come in at the last minute sometimes oftentimes and, and help them through this process is, you seeing a lot of last minute signups still? 100%. We're still talking to businesses now that we need to comply in the States where the reports have already gone and we kind of thought this was going to go away, it's, uh and we're now realizing the financial implication of it. So a lot of the work, I mean. kind of March this year just before Oregon was submitted, it really was. The whole team were working flat out with companies to really try and establish what data they had, where that sat, and how we can kind of pull that together into the reporting categories for Oregon. And we were doing the same for Colorado and California. I think this is... This is new and often the data, I mean, we're very used to the fact that no data source contains everything. Normally we're having to kind of piecemeal things together, but this was really going back to the real ground to work out what do you have, how can we formulate that into a kind of methodology and doing a lot of work around kind of estimated data where things don't. unavailable. yeah, lots of last minute pieces. But I mean, again, the goalposts were changing quite a lot at the time. I sympathize with people and the team did work some long hours though this year. I'm totally impressed with what you've done and what you've accomplished at Lorax and your team. Like you said, it's grown dramatically. It's put in incredible amounts of work and you and Michelle and everyone there has working hours that most people wouldn't want to work. know, this is this, but commend you for your effort and for putting in that kind of service to your clients. You've mentioned data a few times. I want to talk about that because I think that's like the most important part of all of this is how do you gather the data? What's the secret? How can we tell our clients, uh your clients, what, what they need and what's needed when they come to you. Yeah, it's an understandable question because the trickiest part of EPR is that no one scheme wants the same data as another. And we've seen that absolutely in Oregon and Colorado and California. I mean, there were some similarities with Oregon and Colorado for sure, but the breadth of data needed to accurately report can be quite, that's not the word. not the word, not that prehensive, intimidating. So the breadth of data that you need can be quite intimidating. So what we do with clients is we really look at. First of all, we tend to do a data screening exercise where we're really looking at, okay, what do you have? Let's look at that in relation to the products you sell, because you really want to be gathering as broad a pool as data as you can. And especially if you're going out and doing data collection exercises, you don't want to have to be doing this six months later because you've realized that you haven't got PCR content or you haven't got information with regards to the colors. So we really look at it from a... a parameters perspective, looking at EPR reporting as a whole, rather than looking at the specific scheme requirements, because that's where you can start then going down a rabbit hole of just, I've just got an Oregon data set, but actually now when I'm trying to do my Colorado report, it's really difficult. So I would say you need to be as broad as you can with the data that you collect. And em when we're working with clients where They are starting from scratch, absolutely focusing on top selling products, the suppliers that are providing you the most amount of data because you want to go out and collect as much data as you can that's going to impact your total classification figures. So there's a... It's a lot of work for companies, especially when you're not necessarily just considering your primary packaging as well, because I work, we work with a lot of businesses where they probably got a very good picture of actually the packaging that is immediately going around the product. But actually how that's then reaching a customer is a piece that can, be a known, especially when you're selling through distribution channels or you've got an e-commerce platform or, or you're not the person that's, that's passing it on to the final customer. So it's also being able to have a a picture of how does that end up with a customer, shipping, what e-commerce, what extra pieces of packaging are you adding onto it? And that's where often you're having to go to multiple sources. You might need to go to your distribution center. You might need to go to your primary packaging supplier or your pack filler. it's a puzzle and a lot of work that we do is around trying to really untangle that and get as much. breadth of data as possible to allow reporting now and in the future. Oh, great point. Not just today, but the potential of future reports and then changes to EPR, uh new states coming on. Eventually there may be 50 states in the US that require different things that, and you know, I know that's scary thought, but it's certainly not easy today with just seven. And, you know, the, you said, California, Oregon. Washington, these states are, they're, they're different Colorado. Um, and we need to be ready for them. which is why it's so valuable to, partner with a team like yours. I did want to congratulate you. I had the pleasure of going to rugby England to your grand opening, for, for one of your new floors. And now you are announcing that you're taking over the whole building, which is so exciting. Oh, okay. office on every floor, so we will have 50 % of the offices, but it's fantastic. It's well needed. We have this quite complicated desk booking policy and people have to jump in where they can, so it will hopefully alleviate some of that. Good. It's a beautiful building, beautiful town that you live in. I would say, would you call it a town or a village even? No, it's definitely a town. There's a lot of us. But it's a big, it's a big place and it's a beautiful place. And I'd highly recommend to any of your clients to come, come by for a visit because it's worth the trip. it's nice to have an office now. We have had clients to the site. It's nice to have a nice site for people to come in and see and meet us in. Because face-to-face meetings are always as lovely as meetings over Teams are. Nothing quite beats sitting next to somebody and going through the challenges and the data with them. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. Well, let's talk about AI. A lot of companies are coming out with these new AI powered platforms that just with the push of a button say that they'll solve your EPR reporting issues. Why is that a dangerous way of thinking? And why is Lorax such an improvement to that? I So I think with AI, absolutely has its place. It's a great tool. I use it on daily basis for some marketing pieces. But when it comes to EPR, it's so nuanced and how the legislation applies to a business. can be very different from one company to another. So I think AI is often gonna tell you what it thinks you want to hear. And it can mean that you're often led down a rabbit hole and come to conclusions that aren't necessarily correct. And that's because basically the only information AI has to go on is a computer. A computer doesn't know what has come before, what are the companies in your... industry are doing. can't, they don't know what's happened at a conference last year or the webinar that you sat in with a producer responsibility organisation. It's not going to give you that depth of knowledge about how does the legislation apply to you, how do I need to manage that, what has been done before, what do we anticipate coming next. and how does that apply to apply to me? So I think we... We don't go down the AI route because we've got a fantastic team of consultants and policy analysts and researchers and data analysts who have all worked within the industry for years and have a very fantastic knowledge of global legislation and reporting and what that looks like. So I think we are very lucky in the fact that we can call upon all of our resources that we have. mean, there's almost 80 of us in the business now that have all worked within EPR for a fair amount of time. Um, I think that's where our benefit is over an AI tool. That's only going to give you a very kind of two dimensional view of a legislation that isn't, you can't often prove or disprove. So that's why I would bear obviously fear towards using a company like us over a, over an AI based tool. Yeah, well said. There's so much experience in your building and, you've got, like you said, uh, 80 or 90 people there, which is incredible. Uh, but that's what it takes to have analysts that, that just analyze Canada and just, know, this, I was so impressed by that. Yeah. I'm, I gotta meet him Aaron. Just like, wow, he's totally focused on Canada and Canadian policy. And I think that's what it takes to be. different and to think ahead and to think about what your clients will actually need and how they can prepare. What an incredibly valuable partner you guys are. I think it's also absolute testament why we speak to businesses that are struggling with one person in a sustainability department trying to understand how this legislation affects them. I tell them, I was like, there's 75, 80 of us and it takes all of us to understand how this legislation is going to apply to your business. So yeah, I can completely empathise with people that are coming to us to say this is a lot and I need some help with that. So I wanted to ask your advice. People like me in the industry that work for a company like Atlantic packaging, what should we be telling our clients other than, Hey, go work with Lorax EPI? mean, what, yeah. I think it's, I think to understand that there's resources that can absolutely support and do guidance. When we're looking at the, in the US, CAA has fantastic webinars, they have fantastic resources available to help companies understand what the legislation is on a generic, on a generic basis. Obviously then working with a company like ours, we can really help. understand how that legislation applies to them but for somebody that is starting out and doing it I think it is knowing that data is king and the more information you can gather about the packaging you are providing to businesses or that you are getting from a packaging supplier is really key and know that there are resources available. to support with that and unfortunately you don't want to be a bearer of too bad news but unfortunately it's only getting more complicated and it's only getting bigger so it's probably also something not to sit on, it's not going away and the more of a handle exactly, the more of a handle you can get on it at the start it's going to absolutely help in the future. And Lorax does a webinar series, right? That's been really insightful. a, yeah, we do a biannual webinar every December and m June where we run through our consulting team, run that and they go through all the kind of regulatory changes and what's coming up. And we do that across each continent. And then we have just started a Lorax Learn Free webinar series, which is really looking at, I don't want to say the basics, but it's really kind of trying to highlight certain topics, just kind of 20, 30 minute bite-sized sessions where we've done one, what is EPR? What does it mean? Why is it here? And Sean did a fantastic one about labeling requirements last week. And then we've got a couple more in the pipeline for January. And I think there's real benefit in it because there is a lot of resources out there and we have a lot of knowledge within our team. So it makes absolute sense for us to kind of share that knowledge. with a wider team. There's no point in us just keeping it to ourselves. Well, you're doing a great job and you have become the, think the most well-known, the highest touted uh source for this information. So thank you for that. And the circular action Alliance. it's not my knowledge but our team are fantastic, we're very lucky. I'll take the kudos for sure. You deserve it. The circular action Alliance is another good, good spot. Like you mentioned to, to reach out to and to participate in their webinars as well. wanted to think about something a little differently here. Do you think EPR will ever be kind of standardized around the world? Is that, is that even a possibility or at least in different countries? I think that there definitely is possibilities of some standardisation, but I think that I can't see us ever having one standardised EPR report because ultimately there's barriers to standardisation globally. mean, infrastructure within each country, a recycling structure in one country is never going to be the same in the other. So if you had a reporting or fee category structure, it's never going to be the same from one country to the next because how something can be recycled in one country is going to differ. We have things like the PPWR in Europe which is upcoming which will... and that's the packaging and packaging waste regulation, that is absolutely going to provide standardisation for certain topics, things like labelling, which is going to be a massive help to businesses, maybe just the standardisation of what labels need to be put on materials. And again, there will be some standardisation with regards to reporting frequencies or reporting categories, but I can't see a time when every government decides that they're happy with the same taxation system. So I don't think we will see a standardization of EPR. It doesn't mean there won't be common themes. And I think one of the piece, a lot of the work that we do with customers is... We're often working with businesses where they're not just reporting in America or they're not just reporting in Europe. They have this global footprint. So it's being able to know that actually the eco modulation in France, we've seen that it's growing. It's complicated, expected to... come across to the US, obviously we've got the Colorado Ecomodulation coming up and it's providing that guidance to say, well this is how what Ecomodulation looks like in France. It's not going to be the same as Colorado, but this is the type of information that you're going to need. So there are, there are similarities and I think when you work with a company that has a global footprint, we can absolutely help kind of shine a light on where those similarities are and make sure that you are. being able to accurately report regardless of the jurisdiction. think with for a company like ours, we have a software that automatically calculates and dissects the data to each reporting platform. So it doesn't theoretically matter to what the businesses that we work with, whether it's the same report in every market or a different one, because it's our responsibility to create that report. I appreciate that everybody works with me. Well, well done. And, um, I, how do people get in touch with you? How do they reach out to Lorax, EPI and you Lydia in particular? So we have a LinkedIn, just search for Lorax EPI. We're pretty active on LinkedIn. My marketing guy, Josh, the page really busy. Otherwise, is just reach out by email. I am lgedis at loraxcompliance.com, or there's an info at loraxcompliance.com, or you can just go on loraxcompliance.com and reach out to us there. I'll put all those links in the show notes. So if you're listening, you can just scroll up and you can click on those there. Easy, easy to reach out to Lydia and her team at Lorax. EPI. Lydia, thank you so much for being on the show. You're a wealth of knowledge. appreciate your wisdom and it's been fun. It's been really fun, thank you so much for having me.