TerraCycle and Taco Bell claim that over five years, one million sauce packets and single-serve containers have been collected through the Taco Bell Sauce Container US Recycling Program, to be repurposed or recycled.
Taco Bell’s hot sauce packets are made from single-use flexible film materials that can be difficult to recycle through traditional kerbside systems. In 2021, Taco Bell and TerraCycle teamed up to pilot a national recycling programme for used sauce packets, aiming to help keep hard-to-recycle packets out of landfills.
The programme accepts all brands and types of empty sauce containers, not just Taco Bell’s, and is open to anyone across the contiguous U.S. Accepted types of containers include sauce packets, sauce dipping cups, souffle cups and lids and coffee creamer pods.
Interested parties can sign up through TerraCycle. Taco Bell Rewards customers can use the same email address as their account to be eligible for bonus Rewards points throughout the year.
One registered, participants can collect the empty sauce packets and other accepted single-serve containers in a box and print a free shipping label by logging in to the TerraCycle portal. The box can then be shipped to TerraCycle where the empty containers will be rinsed, sorted, processed and then recycled into raw recycled material.
In other recycling scheme news, Asda claims that 20 million coffee pods have been returned to its stores as part of Podback’s recycling scheme, with over 250,000 Podback bags received via Asda’s toYou counters since January 2025. Through the Podback partnership, customers can fill a Podback bag with used pods and drop it at any participating Asda toYou counter.
In Canada, Keurig Dr Pepper Canada and Circular Materials are encouraging consumers to recycle their plastic K-Cup pods at home via Ontario’s Blue Box Program. The pods have reportedly been designed for recycling, including an easy-peel lid with a built-in tab.
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