Inspiring action since 2004, Recycle Week is the nation’s biggest annual celebration of recycling, led by Recycle Now.
This year’s campaign, running from 14 to 20 September, is showing people how recycling can make a real difference when it is done properly, and Cheltenham Borough Council is proud to support it.
Each year, billions of items that could be recycled are put in the wrong bins around the UK. Each item that is recycled correctly helps save energy and keeps valuable materials in circulation to be used again.
To help bring this to life, the Recycle Week campaign stars a cast of recyclable characters, whose stories show how valuable they are, and why they’re worth rescuing from the rubbish. The lineup includes:
- Shampers the shampoo bottle – who can be recycled into a plastic garden chair
- Spritz the fragrance bottle – who could come back as a champagne bottle
- Rolly the toilet roll tube – who can be turned into a notebook
- Deo the aerosol – who could become part of a bike
- Minty the toothpaste tube – who can be recycled into another toothpaste tube
- Trigger the cleaning spray bottle – who can be recycled again into a new spray bottle
- Yogi the yoghurt pot – who can come back as another yoghurt pot
- Ally the kitchen foil – who can be recycled into part of a car engine
New for this year is Neil the banana peel who can be used to create green energy and be recycled into fertiliser.
Thanks to industry innovation and WRAP’s technical expertise, toothpaste tubes can now be collected by some local authorities in kerbside collections for recycling—marking a major step forward in tackling hard-to-recycle items.
2026 has been a big year for recycling, already. New policy, upcoming changes, and packaging developments, all helping improve recycling rates and we have now added cartons to our kerbside collection with flexible plastics coming soon. However, nothing changes without people choosing to recycle. This year Cheltenham is taking part in Recycle Week to help our community have maximum impact. Helping change behaviour, so that the right things go in the right bins.
Councillor Steve Harvey, cabinet member for waste, recycling, parks, gardens and green open spaces, said:
I want to thank Cheltenham residents for recycling as much as they do but we can all recycle more at kerbside.
“From 1 April this year residents can also recycle cartons/tetrapak which go in the plastic and cans box or bin. From Monday 2 November – flexible plastic bags and wrappings can also be recycled at kerbside using the blue bag provided OR by re-using a plastic bag from home (no bigger than a carrier bag please). Look out for information about this coming soon
Waste Minister Emma Hardy says:
I fully support Recycle Week and its aim to help people recycle more of the right things, more often.
This government is making recycling simpler and more consistent by ending the postcode lottery for recycling services and ensuring households can recycle the same core materials wherever they live.
"This Recycle Week, I encourage everyone to check the Recycle Now Locator to see what can be recycled in their area and help keep more valuable materials in use for longer.
Catherine David, CEO, WRAP says
Recycling is one of the easiest ways we can all help to divert millions of tonnes of waste from landfill and incineration, conserve scarce natural resources and cut carbon emissions. Each year millions of shampoo bottles, aluminium foil, toothpaste tubes and other recycling are binned when they could be recycled, so this Recycle Week we're asking people to be a hero at home and rescue more recycling. Together with local authorities and communities, we’re making it easier to keep these valuable materials in use and give our recycling a second life.
To find out more about Recycle Week this year, visit: www.recyclenow.com/recycle-week-2026
