Aldi and Arla trial UV tagging to track milk bottle recycling | 21-08-2026 |

Hardly a month goes by without AIPIA member company Polytag announcing a new trial for its UV tagging technology. The latest announcement is from UK supermarket Aldi and dairy cooperative Arla who are adopting the recycling technology platform on an operational pilot at its Oakthorpe site, to track milk bottle packaging through the recycling process. The project uses Sun Chemical’s specially developed ink on wrap-around labels. The labels, printed by Saica Flex, are designed to support real-time tracking of packaging as it moves through the recycling stream.

During this pilot, invisible UV tags are printed directly onto packaging labels utilizing food-safe fluorescent ink that has undergone safety and recycling testing. The companies say that the ink is applied using standard printing methods, making it a low-cost and easy-to-integrate solution that doesn’t impact production speed. Next Polytag’s Plastic Detection Units installed at Materials Recovery Facilities capture barcode-level data in real-time in the recycling stream. This information is accessible via the company’s dashboard. Alice Rackley, CEO at Polytag, explains, “This next phase deployment with Aldi and Arla milk bottle labels demonstrates the scalability and reliability of the UV-tagging solution.

This represents continued progress in packaging design, offering brands a seamless, cost-effective path to comprehensive recycling insights.”
The data captured through UV-tagging represents a first step toward mapping the lifecycle of product packaging, enabling brands to measure progress against sustainability targets and make data-informed decisions to improve recyclability and recycling performance.
Luke Emery, plastics and packaging director at Aldi UK, adds, “This next phase with Polytag represents a step forward in how we use data to drive our sustainability strategy. By integrating this advanced traceability technology into our packaging, we can gain deeper insights into the lifecycle of our materials.” Helena Delgado Nordmann, head of sustainability at Arla Foods UK, continues, “As Europe’s largest dairy cooperative, Arla is committed to understanding how our packaging performs beyond point of sale. We hope to gain valuable insight into how milk bottle packaging moves through the recycling system, helping us to make more informed decisions about future packaging developments and our ongoing efforts to improve packaging circularity.”

Stefaan D’hoore, director of business development, specialty ink and coatings at Sun Chemical, commented, “This next phase of the collaboration showcases Sun Chemical’s proprietary fluorescent ink technology for wrap-around labels. The ink has been tested against Recyclass’s Washing Quick Test Procedures and the European PET Bottle Platform Quicktest QT 507 with good results. This deployment marks a milestone as the first commercial use of our fluorescent ink with this technology.”