Summary and conclusions

Rækker REACH ud til forbrugeren? - Detailhandelsvirksomheders arbejde med forbrugerforventninger til REACH

Reach Retail Project

With REACH consumers have obtained rights to get information about the presence of Substances of Very High Concern in products. So far, consumers interest has been limited.

The aim of this project has been to:

create a small preliminary study of consumer expectations to REACH
prepare a draft for a shop-guide on handling REACH
discuss the draft with a number of retail stores

The consumer survey in the project shows, that consumers are generally unaware that REACH provides opportunities to obtain information about products containing SVHC.

Three workshops for retailers showed that shops neither have the resources nor the expertise on SVHC. Therefore the updated information on each product's content of SVHC must be obtained from the importer. Still the shop needs to know how to handle questions from consumers and get the relevant information from the importer.

The candidate list of SVHC is complicated and difficult to understand for shops as well as consumers. It is particularly difficult to understand which substances are included, and in which products they might occur. The 45 day time limit, for answering consumer’s questions, is one of the reasons for the moderate interest.

The project has shown, that the resources to answer consumer’s questions about SVHC can’t be expected to be present in the retail-store. The resources for obtaining the relevant and updated information should be found in the purchasing dept. in the retail chains. Currently purchasers lack the necessary knowledge that will enable them to demand products without SVHC from importers. At the same time, they lack the skills to handle replies to consumer inquiries.