The EU has banned destroying unsold stock. What it means for brands.
The rules on destroying unsold stock have just changed. From 19th July 2026, under the EU’s Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation, large companies can no longer destroy unsold clothing, footwear and accessories. Destruction is defined broadly: landfill, incineration, shredding and any other form of definitive disposal all count, and companies must now disclose each year what they discard. The regulation also spells out the opposite of destruction, the things you are meant to do instead: donate, resell, even at a reduced price, send for refurbishment, or recycle. The scale it is targeting is real. Europe destroys an estimated 4 to 9% of unsold textiles before they are ever worn, generating around 5.6 million tonnes of CO2 a year.
To fix a problem you have to understand why it happened, and here the driver was economics. Sell unsold stock to a liquidator and you might recover 5 to 10p in the pound. Add the cost of picking, packing and shipping it, plus the cost of warehousing it while it waits, and the recovery can end up smaller than the cost of recovering it. At that point a brand tells itself that destroying is the rational choice. At the premium end there is a second motive: destroy it rather than let it leak to the grey market, get discounted, or seed counterfeits, all of which dent the scarcity the price depends on. The most infamous example is Burberry, which burned around 28.6 million euros of stock in 2018 to protect brand value. France banned the practice first, and the EU has now followed.
The point the regulation makes is simple: it does not matter what a product cost to make or what you would get back for it, you cannot just destroy it, you have to do something positive instead. For a conscious brand that is not a burden, it is the goal restated as law: design so your product never becomes waste in the first place. And the pressure works upstream too, because a brand that cannot cheaply dispose of mistakes has every reason to stop over-ordering and over-manufacturing. Resale that genuinely pays is the opportunity. A curated reseller like Kidswear Collective, which sells pre-loved and past-season designer childrenswear in checked, authenticated condition, returns sellers up to 60%, around six times what a liquidator pays, and keeps every piece in use. Build your surplus route now, before a buyer asks you what yours is.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
What counts as destroying unsold stock under the EU rules?
Under the EU Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation, destruction means intentionally damaging or disposing of a product as waste. That includes landfill, incineration, shredding and any other form of definitive disposal. From 19th July 2026 it is banned for large companies selling unsold clothing, footwear and accessories into the EU.
Why did brands destroy unsold stock instead of reselling it?
Two reasons. The economics: a liquidator may return only 5 to 10p in the pound, and once shipping and storage are added the recovery can cost more than it is worth. And brand protection: at the premium end, brands destroyed stock to avoid grey-market discounting and counterfeits, as when Burberry burned around 28.6 million euros of stock in 2018.
What can brands do with unsold stock instead of destroying it?
The regulation lists the alternatives: donate it, resell it including at a reduced price, send it for refurbishment, or recycle it. Curated resale partners can return far more than a liquidator while keeping products in circulation. Designing for circularity so stock does not become waste is the longer-term answer.
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