California Isn't Simply Asking Companies to Use Less Plastic
When California enacted SB 54, much of the conversation centered on Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), producer registration, and future recycling fees. While those elements are undoubtedly significant, another component of the law has received comparatively little attention: Source Reduction.
Unlike traditional recycling initiatives, source reduction focuses on preventing material from entering the marketplace in the first place. Rather than asking how packaging should be managed after use, it asks whether that packaging—or portions of it—are necessary at all.
For consumer packaged goods companies, this represents more than another regulatory requirement. It signals a gradual shift in how packaging will be evaluated throughout its entire lifecycle, from product development and supplier selection to reporting and long-term portfolio management.
Understanding Source Reduction
SB 54 establishes statewide targets requiring a 25 percent reduction in covered plastic packaging by 2032, with interim milestones along the way. While these goals are implemented through California's Producer Responsibility Organization (PRO), participating producers will ultimately need to support those objectives through changes to the packaging they place on the market.
Importantly, the legislation does not prescribe a single method for achieving those reductions. Companies may pursue a variety of approaches depending on the product, the market, and the practical constraints of the packaging itself.
Some reductions may come through familiar design strategies such as lightweighting, right-sizing, or improving packaging efficiency. Others, however, represent more fundamental changes to how products are delivered to consumers.
Beyond Lightweighting
One of the more significant aspects of SB 54 is its recognition that meaningful source reduction extends beyond incremental material savings.
Reuse and refill systems, for example, have the potential to eliminate substantial quantities of single-use packaging by allowing containers to remain in circulation through multiple product cycles. While these systems are not appropriate for every product category, they represent an increasingly important strategy for reducing the overall volume of plastic entering California's waste stream.
Similarly, companies may identify opportunities to eliminate unnecessary packaging components altogether. Decorative sleeves, secondary plastic overwraps, redundant inserts, or other nonessential elements may provide marketing or aesthetic value, but they also contribute additional material that must ultimately be managed within the state's recycling system. As packaging portfolios evolve, many organizations are beginning to reevaluate whether every component continues to serve a meaningful functional purpose.
In many cases, source reduction is less about redesigning a bottle or container and more about questioning long-standing assumptions regarding how products are packaged, displayed, shipped, and sold.
The Operational Challenge
For most organizations, redesigning packaging is only one part of the equation.
Every packaging change creates a cascade of operational activities that extend well beyond engineering. Material specifications must be updated. Supplier declarations may need to be replaced or supplemented. Packaging weights and component hierarchies require revision. Recycled content information must remain current. Regulatory applicability may change, and future EPR reporting must accurately reflect the updated packaging configuration.
These activities rarely occur in isolation. A seemingly simple decision to eliminate a plastic tray or transition to a refillable format can affect procurement, packaging engineering, product development, regulatory affairs, sustainability, and reporting teams simultaneously.
As companies expand product portfolios across multiple jurisdictions, maintaining this information often becomes more challenging than understanding the regulation itself.
Packaging Compliance Is Becoming an Information Management Challenge
The growing complexity of packaging regulation has changed the nature of compliance.
Historically, compliance efforts often focused on understanding individual legal requirements. Increasingly, however, organizations already understand what regulations apply. The greater challenge is maintaining accurate, current, and accessible packaging information as products, suppliers, materials, and regulations continue to evolve.
Each new product launch, supplier qualification, packaging redesign, or market expansion introduces another opportunity for information to become outdated. Without a structured process for managing packaging data, even well-designed compliance programs can struggle to keep pace.
For many CPG companies, packaging compliance is becoming less about interpreting regulations and more about maintaining a reliable system of record that supports ongoing reporting, documentation, and decision-making.
How Cedarline Helps
At Cedarline, we focus on the operational side of packaging compliance.
Rather than providing legal interpretations, we help companies organize, maintain, and manage the information that supports packaging compliance activities. That includes packaging specifications, material data, supplier documentation, regulatory applicability, and the reporting information needed to remain organized and audit-ready as packaging portfolios evolve.
Our objective is straightforward: create a single, reliable source of truth for packaging compliance information so organizations can spend less time chasing documentation and more time bringing products to market.
Disclaimer: This article is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Packaging regulations vary by jurisdiction, product, and business model. Companies should consult qualified legal counsel when interpreting specific legal obligations. Cedarline provides packaging compliance operations and information management services.