SB 343: What Food and Beverage Brands Need to Know About Recyclability Claims Before October 2026

On March 17, 2026, a coalition of 18 trade associations filed suit in the US District Court for the Southern District of California seeking to block enforcement of California's Senate Bill 343 (SB 343), commonly known as the Truth in Recycling law. The lawsuit raises significant constitutional questions, but it does not change what companies selling products in California need to do between now and the law's October 4, 2026, effective date.

This article summarizes the lawsuit, explains the compliance framework that remains in effect, and outlines practical next steps for companies that use the chasing arrows symbol or other recyclability claims on their products and packaging.

What SB 343 Requires

SB 343 significantly restricts when companies can make recyclability claims on products and packaging. The law prohibits the use of the chasing arrows symbol—and similar statements suggesting recyclability—unless specific criteria are met.

The goal is to ensure that materials labeled as recyclable are actually collected, sorted, and reprocessed in practice, rather than relying on theoretical recyclability.

The law takes effect on October 4, 2026, and applies broadly to packaging, labeling, and marketing claims directed at California consumers.

The Lawsuit

The plaintiff coalition, which includes food producers, packaging manufacturers, grocers, restaurants, and several agricultural commissions, seeks declaratory and injunctive relief on 2 constitutional grounds.

First, plaintiffs argue that SB 343 violates the First Amendment by imposing a content-based restriction on truthful commercial speech. The statute categorically prohibits recyclability claims, including qualified statements such as "Recyclable where facilities exist," unless a product or packaging meets rigid statewide criteria. Plaintiffs argue the law fails both strict scrutiny and the intermediate scrutiny standard applied to commercial speech regulations.

Second, plaintiffs argue the law is unconstitutionally vague under the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause. The statute's criteria for determining recyclability, including the 60/60 collection and sortation thresholds, the Basel Convention reclamation requirement, and the material type and form categorizations, are too ambiguous for businesses to apply with reasonable certainty. Plaintiffs note that CalRecycle itself has acknowledged it lacks authority to make binding product-level determinations and has revised its findings multiple times since publishing the initial Material Characterization Study in April 2025.

Companies considering whether to rely on litigation for relief should be aware that, under the US Supreme Court's June 2025 decision in Trump v CASA, Inc, federal district courts generally cannot issue universal injunctions. Any injunction obtained in this case is expected to protect only the plaintiff associations and their members. Membership in a plaintiff trade association may, therefore, be the most direct path to benefit from any court-ordered relief. Other options include intervention in the litigation, filing a parallel suit, or participating in any certified class.

The Compliance Framework Remains in Effect

Regardless of the litigation's progress, companies should continue compliance preparation for the October 4, 2026, effective date. In practice, a recyclability claim is permitted only if it can be substantiated across 4 independent criteria, all of which must be met simultaneously:

1. Collection and sortation. The material type and form must be collected by recycling programs serving at least 60% of California's population, and must be sorted into defined streams by large volume transfer or processing facilities serving at least 60% of programs statewide. CalRecycle's April 2025 Material Characterization Study Final Findings Report, along with subsequent updates in August 2025 and December 2025, identifies which material types and forms meet these thresholds. Importantly, the Report operates at the material category level. CalRecycle’s study, by itself, does not determine whether a specific product or package can lawfully be labeled recyclable, because other product- or package-specific criteria must still be evaluated.
2. Reclamation under the Basel Convention. The sorted material must be sent to reclaiming facilities consistent with the requirements of the Basel Convention. CalRecycle has acknowledged that it does not assess or verify this criterion, and it does not have the authority to require the underlying end-market data. Businesses are effectively left to substantiate this element on their own, using best-available supply chain information. This gap is one of the core vagueness arguments in the plaintiffs' complaint.
3. Design and performance. The product or packaging must be designed to ensure recyclability, with no components, inks, adhesives, or labels that prevent it. For plastic packaging, alignment with the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR) Design Guide is a commonly used benchmark. This analysis must be conducted at the SKU level because design features such as coatings, laminates, pigments, attached components, small parts below sortation size thresholds, or problematic adhesives can disqualify an otherwise recyclable material.
4. Chemical restrictions. The product or packaging must not contain heavy metals (lead, mercury, cadmium, hexavalent chromium) at or above 100 parts per million, or intentionally added PFAS, or PFAS measured as total organic fluorine at or above 100 ppm. Compliance must be documented through testing, supplier certifications, or equivalent evidence.

The key practical point is that meeting the collection and sortation thresholds is only the first step. A company making a recyclability claim must be able to substantiate all 4 criteria simultaneously, and must maintain written records supporting each element under California Business and Professions Code section 17580. Notably, the record-keeping provisions are not challenged in the litigation and remain in effect regardless of the case's outcome.

Enforcement Risk Is Already Real

Even before SB 343's effective date, the law is being used to support existing consumer protection claims. More than 30 private actions have been filed citing SB 343, asserting claims under California's Unfair Competition Law, False Advertising Law, and Consumers Legal Remedies Act. The California attorney general has also brought multiple enforcement actions referencing the statute. Private plaintiffs' counsel are treating SB 343's definitions as predicate standards for claims that are otherwise actionable today.

This enforcement environment means the practical risk of leaving unsubstantiated recyclability claims in place is not limited to what happens on October 4, 2026. Companies with recyclability language on current packaging, websites, or marketing materials face litigation exposure now.

Practical Recommendations

Companies should approach SB 343 compliance as a multiworkstream project rather than a labeling update. Recommended actions include the following:

• Conduct a comprehensive audit of packaging artwork, product inserts, shipping materials, website content, and marketing materials to identify every instance of a chasing arrows symbol, "recyclable" claim, "please recycle" statement, or similar language.
• Complete a 4-criteria substantiation file for each claim retained: collection and sortation analysis using CalRecycle's latest Report, a design review against the APR Design Guide or equivalent standard, chemical compliance documentation for heavy metals and PFAS, and a reclamation pathway record based on best available end-market data.
• Remove or revise the claim where substantiation cannot be established. For composite products where a recyclable component coexists with nonrecyclable components, a qualified claim that identifies which component is recyclable and instructs consumers to separate nonrecyclable elements is generally more defensible than a broad claim.
• Establish a manufacture-date tracking protocol. SB 343 applies based on the date of manufacture, not the date of sale. Products manufactured before October 4, 2026, are not subject to the restrictions regardless of when they sell through.
• Review supplier and co-manufacturer agreements to address SB 343 compliance responsibilities, documentation obligations, and indemnification for noncompliant artwork or materials.
• Evaluate trade association membership, with attention to which associations are plaintiffs in the pending litigation.

The Bottom Line

SB 343 is a substantiation-driven law, not a labeling default. A recyclability claim under SB 343 is defensible only if it can be supported across 4 independent criteria, many of which CalRecycle does not validate. The pending lawsuit may provide relief for some businesses, but the practical work of auditing claims, substantiating retained ones, and building compliant documentation should proceed in parallel.