Whether packaging EPR reaches you is two questions, not one: are you the producer, and if so are you above the small-producer threshold. This page is the first. The producer cascade differs in every state, California has no importer tier, and private label sits near the top rather than the bottom.
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Working out whether U.S. packaging EPR reaches you breaks into two separate tests, and most confusion comes from running them together. First, are you the producer for a given item in a given state. That turns on a statutory cascade, and the cascade is different in each state. Second, if you are the producer, are you above the small-producer threshold. That is a separate question with its own numbers, covered on the de minimis thresholds page.
This page is the first test. A company can be plainly the producer and still be exempt on volume, and a company can be under a threshold in one state and over it in another. Run them in order and per state.
Want the answer rather than the rules? The Scope Screener asks seven questions and returns a per-state read, with the rule behind each answer and a label showing whether that rule was read in the primary text. Free, no signup.
The obligation follows the brand on the package, not the factory that made it. Your packaging manufacturer is generally not the obligated producer, though every state gives suppliers data duties, because a brand owner cannot file without component data it does not hold. If your brand appears on packaging sold into an enacted state, start from the assumption that you are the producer and work the cascade to see whether anything displaces that.
Beyond that shared principle the states diverge, and the differences are large enough to change who files.
Colorado (C.R.S. 25-17-703(30)(a)) and Oregon (ORS 459A.866(1)(a)) use structurally identical cascades for packaging. Each stops at the first tier that applies.
Note what the importer tier actually keys on. It is import into the United States, not import into that state, and it only engages when the first two tiers are empty domestically. A U.S. brand owner never pushes the obligation down to its importer.
California runs a different cascade under Public Resources Code 42041(w), and two of the differences matter operationally.
California has no importer tier at all. The words importer and imports do not appear in the hierarchy. The backstop is a seller and distributor tier, which catches more parties than an importer test would, because it reaches anyone placing the product into the state rather than only the party that brought it into the country.
California asks whether you are in the state, not in the United States, and under 14 CCR 18980.1.1 that is a personal jurisdiction test rather than a physical presence one. A person is in the state if subject to the jurisdiction of California courts under Code of Civil Procedure 410.10. A foreign company amenable to California long-arm jurisdiction therefore stays high in the cascade instead of dropping to the backstop tier. That is a materially different mechanic from Colorado and Oregon.
Maryland's chapter, COMAR 26.04.14, approaches it from the other direction. Rather than only cascading, it carves entities out of the producer definition entirely. A person is not a producer if they are a State or federal agency, a political subdivision or other governmental unit, a registered 501(c)(3) charitable organization or 501(c)(4) social welfare organization, a mill using any virgin wood fiber in the products it produces, or a paper mill producing containerboard from recycled content.
A de minimis producer is also outside the definition rather than merely relieved of a duty, which is a distinction worth noticing if you are documenting your position. The operative duty for everyone else sits at 26.04.14.06C: a producer may not sell or distribute products using covered materials in the State unless it is registered with an approved producer responsibility organization or holds an approved Individual Producer Plan.
A retailer selling its own store brand is commonly assumed to be a producer of last resort. It is the opposite. In Colorado and Oregon a private-label retailer fails the first tier, because the goods do not carry the manufacturer's brand, and lands in the second tier as the brand licensee, with the importer below it. In California a store-brand retailer is the in-state brand owner. In every case the retailer sits above the fallback tiers, not beneath them.
One ambiguity worth knowing about if this is your situation. The Colorado and Oregon packaging tiers both say licensee of a brand or trademark, not owner, while a private-label retailer is normally the brand owner rather than a licensee. Colorado's own paper-product tier says owner or licensee, and California's statute says owns or is the licensee, so the omission in the packaging tiers reads as a drafting gap rather than a deliberate exclusion. In practice producer responsibility organizations treat private-label retailers as producers. If your obligation turns on this point, take advice rather than reading the tier list literally.
All three detailed-reporting states run separate producer rules for particular packaging types, and these beat the general hierarchy. This is where a company that has confidently answered the general question gets a different answer for part of its portfolio.
Minnesota is not a wait-and-see state. Producers were required to appoint a producer responsibility organization by January 1, 2025 under Minn. Stat. 115A.1443. That is the producer-facing duty, and it is distinct from the organization's own duty to register with the commissioner by July 1, 2026 and each January 1 after that. Fees and detailed reporting arrive later.
Washington requires producers to be a member of a registered producer responsibility organization after July 1, 2026, or to register as one implementing an individual plan, under 2SSB 5284 section 104(1)(a). The organization registers with Ecology by March 1, 2026 and annually after. The enforcement point comes later: from March 1, 2029 a producer that is not a member in good standing and has not submitted an individual plan may not introduce covered materials into the state.
Maryland runs on the definition and registration structure described above, with Individual Producer Plans due to the Department by July 1, 2028 and a market restriction from October 29, 2028.
Maine is genuinely pre-program. The stewardship organization had not been selected as of late July 2026, so there is no producer registration, reporting or fee obligation to meet yet. It is a watch item rather than a compliance gap.
Packaging manufacturers, converters and component suppliers are generally not the obligated producer, because the obligation follows the brand. They do carry data duties, and in practice those are substantial: brand owners cannot complete a filing without component material, weight, resin and recyclability data that only the supplier holds. If you supply packaging, expect structured annual data requests rather than a filing obligation. The exception to check is whether you also sell anything unbranded or under your own brand, which can place you in the producer tier for those items.
Governments and, in some states, registered nonprofits are excluded outright. Small producers may be excluded by threshold, which is the second test and is covered separately on the de minimis page.
Three habits make this tractable. Run the cascade per state rather than once, because the answer genuinely differs. Run it per packaging type where a material-specific rule applies, because your retail packaging and your shipping boxes can land on different parties. And document the reasoning at the time, not later, because a position that is obvious to you now is the one a successor will have to reconstruct.
The Scope Screener runs all of this in seven questions and returns a per-state read with the rule and evidence label behind each answer. Where the rules genuinely do not settle the question, it says so rather than guessing, because licensing, co-packing, franchise and corporate-group structures regularly produce answers a form cannot reach. For those, get in touch.
Every state guide carries the full fee schedule, registration deadlines, program plan status, eco-modulation detail, statute and rule text, and exemptions.