Cork Recycling Scheme
With over 70 active stockists across the UK, we invite you to join our free, nationwide cork recycling scheme. Encourage recycling in-store, improve your sustainability, and give customers a fun reason to return again and again.
Breathe a second life into your cork wine stoppers by dropping them at one of LIGA's drop-off points, they will be sent to us - free of charge - using our eco recycling bags.
Around 13 billion cork stoppers are produced and thrown out each year. That's enough to circle the globe 10 times. However, only about 1% of cork stoppers are actually recycled. We want to do our bit to change that.
We’ve introduced this initiative as part of a larger global effort to reduce waste and promote a circular economy. Anyone can buy a bottle of wine with a cork wine stopper, enjoy it, and save the cork wine stopper. Then bring the cork wine stoppers to their nearest LIGA Cork Recycling Partner. We supply cork recycling bins to a number of stockists around the UK.
The Corks are returned to Portugal, where they are ground down, and the granules are used to make products such as insulation and flooring.
Equally important for our future, we are pledging to plant Cork Oak trees - for every 100 kilos of cork collected, we will plant one cork oak tree - an emblem of biodiversity preservation and a powerful weapon against climate change.
Your involvement will directly contribute to the reforestation and restoration of natural habitats, ensuring a greener and healthier world for future generations. In recent years, the cork harvest yields have been down. Lack of water impacts the quality and thickness of the bark that can be harvested, and we all know that we have experienced hotter, drier summers. This is why recycling is so important, and one of the reasons it is important to plant more cork oak trees.
You can see our map of stockists and recycling bins here.
Common questions about cork
All of our cork is sourced from Portugal.
Cork has high eco credentials from its growth to the way it is harvested to the way it is made into products. The cork dust is used to make 60% of the energy needed to power the factory. Cork is harvested naturally by hand.
Cork harvesting is a natural process performed by highly skilled workers, by hand. The process has remained unchanged for centuries. it does not hurt the tree and the bark grows back ready to be harvested again in nine years.
They grow mostly in the Mediterranean. In Portugal they grow in forests called Montado which are home to many endangered species such as the Imperial Eagle and the Iberian Lynx.