Doing the right thing, every day: how Specsavers is making recycling easier in our UK stores

At Specsavers, sustainability isn’t a buzzword or a box-ticking exercise. It’s about doing the right thing for our customers, our colleagues and the communities we’re part of.

One simple but powerful way this shows up is through our UK-wide recycling programme, now available in Specsavers stores. It makes it easier for customers to recycle their unwanted glasses, glasses cases and contact lens packaging, items that can’t be recycled at home, and helps keep useful materials out of landfill.

It’s practical, it’s visible, and it reflects the kind of business we want to be.

Making recycling easy, accessible and part of everyday life

Thanks to our partnership with MyGroup, a specialist recycling and waste management organisation, customers can bring their used glasses, contact lens packaging and glasses cases into store and know they’ll be handled responsibly.

MyGroup takes care of separating and sorting materials, which are then recycled and repurposed into new, useful products like joinery boards and furniture. That means valuable materials get a second life, rather than being thrown away.

In our financial year 2025/26, this work helped us recycle 70 tonnes of material from UK stores and labs, the equivalent weight of a mature blue whale, and almost five tonnes more than the year before. With our latest investment, some UK stores now offer this service whether customers bought their products from Specsavers or elsewhere.

Why this matters to us

As a healthcare business that’s part of local high streets and communities, we believe responsibility starts with the everyday choices we make.

Recycling in store isn’t about grand gestures. It’s about small, meaningful actions that add up. Actions that reduce waste, make life easier for customers, and help protect the planet at the same time.

“Sustainability should show up in what we do every day. Investing in recycling in our UK stores is a practical step that makes it easy for customers to be part of the solution and keeps valuable materials in use.”

Helen Curran, Head of Sustainability, UK & Ireland

Part of something bigger, globally

What’s happening in the UK is part of a much wider picture. Across Specsavers globally, we’re working to reduce waste and improve how products and materials are used at the end of their life.

That includes:

• Recycling and reuse programmes across the UK, helping divert store waste from landfill.
• A recycling solution in Australia and New Zealand, where more than 51 tonnes of waste were recycled in one year.
• Established recycling partnerships across Northern Europe, including dedicated solutions for glasses.

Together, these initiatives support our ambition to move towards a more circular way of working, where resources are reused wherever possible and waste is reduced at every stage.

What sustainability looks like for our colleagues

Sustainability at Specsavers isn’t owned by one team. It’s something our people bring to life every day.

From store colleagues helping customers use recycling points, to supply chain teams designing smarter systems behind the scenes, everyone plays a part. We also invest in sustainability learning across the business, giving colleagues the confidence and knowledge to understand how their role makes a difference.

If you join Specsavers, you’ll be part of a business that’s:

• Grounded in practical action.
• Serious about caring for people and the planet.
• Always looking for better ways of doing things.

Looking ahead

Rolling out recycling to our UK stores is an important milestone, but it’s definitely not the finish line.

We’ll keep finding ways to reduce waste, reuse materials and make sustainability part of everyday working life, while continuing to deliver affordable, high-quality eye and hearing care.

Because at Specsavers, caring doesn’t stop at sight and hearing. It extends to how we treat the world around us and the role we all play in shaping the future.