Leroy Merlin's one-cent charge per item: the plastic tax

Why you're charged one cent per item at Leroy Merlin

Why does a line for "waste management contribution" appear on the receipt for a screw? The question was raised by a customer who noticed that each item bought at the hardware store added an extra charge. First he mentioned one euro. Then he corrected himself: it was one cent. But the issue isn't the amount, it's the underlying question: if he throws the waste away at the municipal recycling point, why is he paying for its management?

What the waste management contribution is and why it appears on the invoice

The answer lies in Brussels. The charge comes from European Directive 2019/904, transposed in Spain by Law 7/2022, which taxes non-reusable plastic in packaging at €0.45 per kilo. And since this year, invoices must reflect what the company pays to its EPR scheme —Ecoembes or similar— for placing packaging on the market.

It affects anyone who puts packaging into circulation, including SMEs. It's not a whim of the DIY store: it's a cost passed on to the end customer that also appears when buying electronics. The practical consequence is that the consumer pays twice: once at the checkout and again by separating waste at home.

Self-checkout and unmanned tills: the other source of discontent

The conversation soon shifted to another target. Several chains —Decathlon and Leroy Merlin among them— have taken self-checkout to the extreme: a single person attending six terminals, elderly people fending for themselves and queues when something goes wrong. There, the debate isn't about the cent, but about unpaid work. Those who pay and also serve themselves. Some even asked, half-jokingly, whether vacuum packaging would be exempt.

Does recycling benefit the consumer or only the concession holder?

Skepticism extends to the entire system. Some argue that recycling is a business for the concession holder: they charge you for your material and then resell it. And there are harsher analyses: that much of the plastic isn't recycled, that extended producer responsibility systems have been flagged for irregularities, and that the climate debate sidesteps the real problem —waste and the forever chemicals already found in most of the population.

In the end, the cent turns out to be the least of it. The customer pays for the packaging, pays for its management, separates it at home and, if they're lucky, finds someone at the checkout to explain why.