How EPR Compliance Can Pay for Your Sustainability Strategy: a guide for consumer companies

If your company sells packaged goods in states with Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) laws—like California, Oregon, or Colorado—you’re probably feeling the urgency, uncertainty, and financial impact of this compliance. Across food and beverage, beauty, apparel, and packaging industries, EPR fees are climbing into the hundreds of thousands of dollars annually.

But EPR doesn’t need to just be a cost of doing business. When approached strategically, EPR compliance can fund your sustainability program, drive measurable emissions reductions, and even deliver a positive ROI.

The Hidden Opportunity in EPR Compliance

New EPR rules are charging brands steep fees—$50,000 or more in Oregon alone, with large California operations projected to pay up to $2.75 million. Yet those same programs also offer a built-in opportunity: ecomodulation incentives.

By submitting verified, compliant Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs), companies can avoid or reduce fees and qualify for bonuses worth up to $20,000 per SKU, totaling as much as $200,000 annually.

To capture those savings, you need LCAs that meet specific EPR requirements—covering multiple impact categories beyond carbon, verified by third parties, and supported by packaging reduction plans and detailed material inventories.

The problem? Most sustainability teams are already stretched thin managing Scope 1-3 reporting, investor disclosures, stakeholder and customer data requests. Traditional LCA consultancies often deliver static reports that serve only one purpose: compliance. When you need product carbon footprints or updated Scope 3 data, you end up starting—and paying—from scratch.

The Self-Funding Approach: Compliance That Works Harder

With the right technology partner, EPR compliance can be embedded into the foundation of your broader sustainability strategy.

Planet FWD helps brands turn compliance into ROI with EPR-compliant LCAs that deliver immediate financial returns and long-term data value. Companies using the Planet FWD platform have recouped their investment within the first year through ecomodulation bonuses—while also building out credible, ongoing carbon and packaging data systems.

Unlike one-off reports, the Planet FWD platform provides continuous access to your LCA data, letting you:

• Model packaging changes to qualify for future Bonus B incentives
• Identify reduction opportunities for Scope 3 and packaging impacts
• Generate on-demand reports for retail, regulatory, or investor needs

One LCA, Multiple High-Value Use Cases

• Immediate ROI: Reduce or eliminate annual EPR fees.
• Carbon Accounting: Reuse LCA data for corporate and product-level Scope 3 reporting.
• Customer Requirements: Deliver verified product footprints to retail and customer partners.
• Marketing Claims: Back up sustainability claims with third-party-verified data.
• Continuous Improvement: Track packaging optimizations and qualify for future incentives.

Speed Matters for Ecomodulation Incentives

EPR reporting deadlines come fast—and missing them means forfeiting an entire year of potential bonuses. Planet FWD’s process delivers EPR-compliant LCAs in under two months, including support for third-party review through trusted consultant partners.

The platform can also ingest existing packaging data from other systems, eliminating duplicate work and accelerating time to compliance.

Beyond Compliance: Turning Reporting Into Long-Term Value

Once your LCA is complete, the value doesn’t stop. With ongoing access to Planet FWD’s platform, your team can create product variants, model the impact of packaging redesigns, and demonstrate measurable improvement year-over-year—all without paying for new tools.

When your customers request product carbon footprints or investors ask for climate data, you’ll already have verified, defensible data ready to share.

Make EPR Compliance Work for You

EPR regulations are here to stay—but the smartest companies are using them to unlock new value, not absorb new costs.

Planet FWD helps packaging-intensive brands transform compliance into a scalable, ROI-driven sustainability strategy that pays for itself.

Ready to see how peer companies are turning EPR compliance into a strategic advantage? Schedule a call with our Climate Solutions team here.