How To Find The Savings Hiding in Your APCO Report

For many businesses, APCO compliance is often seen as another box to tick or an annual obligation to avoid fines. Once it’s been submitted by March 31, it’s another job done, and the data is often filed away and forgotten before you move on to other pressing matters and deadlines.

But with seismic shifts in the packaging landscape over the last 12 months, this default mindset risks overlooking a growing opportunity to cut costs and build resilience for what’s coming next.

As regulatory and market pressures intensify, packaging data is emerging as a strategic asset. Accurate, granular reporting isn’t just to ensure compliance. It can also uncover savings, reduce environmental impact, and give your business a competitive edge.

The business case for better data

Better data doesn’t just support financial outcomes for sustainability and ESG teams. It strengthens the credibility of impact reporting, future-proofs against evolving disclosure requirements, and builds internal momentum for change.

Accurate data provides the evidence base needed to back emissions reductions, inform packaging redesign, and meet the growing demand for transparency from regulators, investors, and consumers alike.

When businesses have accurate data, they can pinpoint inefficiencies, optimise design, and reduce unnecessary material use. That doesn’t just improve environmental outcomes, it drives real cost savings. Across the Australian market, packaging accounted for $2.1 billion in material spend in 2021–22. If better data helped reduce even 10% of that footprint, the collective savings could exceed $210 million. That’s the scale of value available to Australian brands.

The money hiding in your packaging data

This level of impact isn’t theoretical. Unilever has saved $1.5 billion since 2008 through sustainable sourcing. And their target of 50% fewer bottles (if achieved) will also result in lower costs in addition to reduced emissions and logistics impact.

Phantm has identified millions of cost savings for clients through conducting thorough packaging data asset reviews that include:

• Benchmarking and aggregating data
• Physical materials reduction modelling
• Packaging performance analysis
• Modelling the future impact of change
• Portfolio valuation (often invisible)

The savings we identified were driven by both portfolio-level and SKU-level analysis and supplier engagement. This also didn’t require radical redesign. Just smart, evidence-based optimisation, guided by a clearer understanding of what was being put on market, and where inefficiencies were hiding.

If you’ve already done your APCO reporting, the packaging data you need to do this already exists. The challenge is turning it into insight. All you have to do is hand it over to Phantm, where our team of experts and market-leading technology will surface hidden savings and actionable opportunities.

Eco-modulation is coming

Starting July 2026, eco-modulation will impose differentiated fees based on the recyclability and sustainability of packaging materials. Businesses with turnover above $50 million will be directly affected, though that threshold may shift. Materials like EPS, low-recyclability plastics, and composite formats will carry the highest penalties.

Critically, companies could access up to 25% discounts under the scheme if they redesign packaging with circularity in mind—emphasising recycled content, preferred materials, and reusability. But here’s the catch: to qualify, you need evidence. That means detailed, SKU-level data and documented engagement with suppliers. Guesswork won’t cut it any longer.

Scope 3, EPR, and the rise of evidence-based claims

Eco-modulation isn’t the only pressure point. Scope 3 emissions disclosures and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) schemes are gaining traction globally. In Australia, frameworks like ASRS are setting the stage for formal sustainability reporting across industries.

Europe already collects €3.1 billion per year through EPR programs. In the UK, £1 billion will be raised in 2025 through a comparatively basic scheme. This is not just a compliance issue, it’s a structural shift in how packaging is valued and priced.

For businesses that move early, the benefits are twofold:

1. You stay ahead of regulatory risk
2. Differentiating from slower-moving competitors.

Non-compliance now has real-world costs

Meanwhile, the stakes for non-compliance are rising. Just ask Gainsville Furniture, who were fined nearly $10,000 in February 2025 for failing to respond to a packaging-specific information request from the EPA. Fines can just be the tip of the iceberg. Reputational damage, increased scrutiny, and lost consumer trust can cost far more.

As APCO continues to evolve, so too does the scrutiny from boards, consumers, and investors. The companies that can confidently report on packaging impact, emissions, and end-of-life outcomes will stand apart and outperform the competition.

Unlock the value hiding in your packaging data with Phantm

At Phantm, we help brands go beyond compliance. Our team of packaging and materials experts and market-leading technology delivers:

• A single source of truth for packaging data: Build a unified data set across your packaging portfolio.
• Eco-modulation calculator: Model future fees and potential discounts by material.
• Asset and impact valuation tools: Quantify the business and environmental case for change.
• End-of-life modelling: Understand where your packaging ends up and how to improve it.
• Custom reporting functions: Simplify APCO submissions and prepare for broader ESG disclosures.

As MECCA’s Head of Product Innovation, Kate Forbes, put it:

“The data and insights provided by Phantm are invaluable—they challenge our thinking and test our assumptions.”

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