Am I the “producer” of my packaging?

The most-asked question since the PPWR started applying, and the one nobody answers cleanly. Here it is case by case — a shipping label, a logo sticker, a reused supplier box, newspaper — with the genuinely unsettled parts marked as unsettled rather than papered over.

Written 13 August 2026 · Regulation (EU) 2025/40 · Not legal advice

The short answer

Most sellers get tangled up because they are looking at the wrong definition. The regulation has two that sound alike:

• Manufacturer — Article 3(1)(13). Turns on whose name or trademark the packaging carries. This is the one people assume applies to them.
• Producer — Article 3(1)(15). Turns on who first makes the packaging available on a given national market. This is the one that creates the registration obligation.

You can be the producer without being the manufacturer. That is why buying plain, unbranded boxes from a domestic supplier does not get you out of it — the question is not who made the box, it is who first put it on the market in the country the parcel is going to.

Does a shipping label make me the producer?

The practical point, though, is that it usually does not decide anything. If you are shipping to a consumer in an EU country, you are typically already the producer there under the first-making-available test, label or no label. The label question only bites in the narrow case where somebody else has already placed that packaging on that same national market and you are merely moving it on.

It is worth knowing how much weight this one question is carrying for people. One seller, writing to a German law firm's comment section in August 2026:

Am I a manufacturer if I wrap something in newspaper? Serious question: am I allowed to wrap something in newspaper and ship it? Translated from German, IT-Recht Kanzlei comments, 10 August 2026

Case by case

I buy plain boxes from a domestic supplier and add nothing

You are still the producer for each country you ship into. Your supplier put the box on your country's market; you are putting it on the destination country's market. Those are different obligations owed to different registers.

I put my own logo sticker on the box

Producer, and now arguably manufacturer too. Own-branding brings you within the Article 3(1)(13) manufacturer test as well. It does not create a new registration obligation on top — the producer duty was already there — but it removes any argument that you are merely a distributor.

I reuse the box my supplier's goods arrived in

Producer. The test is about market placement, not novelty. That the box was licensed once, by someone else, in another country, does nothing for the country you are now shipping it to.

I wrap in newspaper, or use no packaging at all

Newspaper used to protect goods in transit is packaging for these purposes — it performs a packaging function. Truly unpackaged goods are outside the regime, but that is a narrow category, and the moment you add a mailing bag or tape you are back in it.

I am a dropshipper and never touch the goods

Germany's packaging register has stated plainly that “as a dropshipper you are not a manufacturer”. Do not over-read that. It addresses the German manufacturer concept; it does not exempt you from the producer test in each country you sell into, and the register has also said the moment of transfer of title is not what decides the question.

Is there a small-seller exemption?

This is the single most common and most expensive misunderstanding. National de minimis thresholds that existed before — the Dutch 50,000 kg figure is the one most often quoted — are not a shield under the Regulation, and a good deal of guidance still circulating online has not caught up.

Which countries need an authorised representative?

Sellers keep searching for that list. It does not exist. Article 45(3) requires a producer not established in a member state to appoint an authorised representative there, and the obligation is per country.

So the useful question is not which countries can I skip, it is which countries earn back what they cost. We built a calculator for exactly that — it takes your parcel volumes and margin and tells you which countries to keep and which to drop.

Hasn't this been suspended?

The Commission proposed suspending Article 45(3) until 2035 in the Environmental Omnibus, COM(2025) 982, on 10 December 2025. As at August 2026 it has not been adopted. The Council declined to fast-track it in June 2026, and the Parliament's environment committee rapporteur has proposed narrowing it to micro and small enterprises only.

You will find pages describing the suspension as though it were law. It is a proposal. Plan around the rules as they are, and treat the suspension as upside if it arrives.

What happens if I ignore it?

Germany replaced its packaging law with the VerpackDG on 12 August 2026, carrying fines up to €200,000. Separately, marketplaces have their own verification duties, so the practical risk for most small sellers is a listing suspension or withheld payouts before it is ever a regulator.

One caveat worth having: a study commissioned in 2026 found that national registers have no APIs and no way to verify a registration number automatically. Some of the delisting warnings in circulation are ahead of what platforms can actually check today. That is an observation about enforcement, not advice to ignore the law.