UK’S LEFTOVER PAINT COULD FILL TWENTY OLYMPIC POOLS
New research from Dulux and the Community RePaint network has revealed that the average UK home has over four cans of unused paint –collectively enough paint to fill 20 Olympic-sized swimming pools.
The research, commissioned by Dulux, comes as Community RePaint opens its 100th network member, with an additional ten members having joined this year, making it more accessible than ever before and enabling more people across the country to donate their leftover paint and benefit the local community.
With one third of homeowners purchasing paint in the last six months, 65% have either accidentally or purposely bought more paint than required. This is despite tools like the Dulux Paint Calculator which quickly and accurately estimates exactly how much paint you need. The average leftover paint can remains unused for 4.3 years, with one in ten leaving paint cans for over a decade. Additionally, nearly a quarter (23%) do nothing with leftover paint whilst nearly a fifth (17%) of respondents admit to keeping old paint simply because they do not know what else to do with it.
However, there is appetite for change: over three quarters (77%) would love to see their surplus paint used in a community project. Despite this, the majority (79%) are unaware of local reuse schemes that could benefit from unused paint. As paint waste is clearly a growing issue in the UK, it is important to educate consumers on how they can give their leftover paint a new life by encouraging circularity and reuse.
Since its inception, Community RePaint has redistributed 5.4 million litres of paint to individuals and community projects and it continues to grow nationwide. The network was originally launched through funding provided by Dulux in 1993 and has been solely sponsored by the brand for over two decades. Alongside redistributing paint, the network also remanufactures it to produce its own ReColour paint.
Peter Howard, Sustainability and CSR Lead at AkzoNobel, the parent company of Dulux paints, commented: “We know many UK households still have reusable leftover paint gathering dust in cupboards and sheds instead of being put to good use. That’s why our longstanding partnership with Community RePaint is so important. It offers a simple, circular solution that redistributes paint to good causes and helps brighten lives. We’re proud to see Community RePaint reach 100 schemes and look forward to helping the network colour even more lives in the future.”
Community RePaint was established to tackle these challenges and encourage greater re-use of leftover paint by recovering and redistributing paint waste to individuals and groups in the wider community at affordable prices, reducing paint going to landfill. According to the British Coatings Federation, 50 million litres of paint are wasted every year in the UK[1]. In 2024 alone, the Community RePaint network helped colour 356,800 lives through redistributing 366,538 litres of paint, positively impacting 2,500 community groups ad 44,500 individuals and families whilst saving the equivalent of 989,625 kg of CO2 emissions.
Lilian Graves, Community RePaint Communications Coordinator, commented: “What sets Community RePaint apart is our commitment to sustainability, so to see the impact our redistribution networks have on helping the UK reduce paint waste is really heartening.
“Community RePaint is determined to find a solution for the 50 million litres of paint that goes to waste in the UK each year. If every unwanted, forgotten can of paint was donated to the Community RePaint network, that’s a lot of a little actions that add up to create a massive difference.”
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