PPWR Declaration of Conformity: Brand-Owner Guide

PPWR Declaration of Conformity for Brand Owners: Who Signs, What Evidence, and How to Own It Across a Portfolio

From August 12, 2026, no packaging may be placed on the EU market unless it is covered by a valid EU Declaration of Conformity drawn up under Article 39 of Regulation (EU) 2025/40 and backed by an Annex VII technical file. There is no phase-in and no grace period: a missing or invalid Declaration means the unit is legally "not placed on the market in conformity," exposing it to withdrawal and penalties. With roughly four weeks left, the uncomfortable reality for most brand owners is that the signature — and the liability — lands on them, not on the packaging supplier who physically made the box, bottle or film.

What Article 39 Actually Requires

Article 39 obliges the manufacturerof packaging to draw up a written EU Declaration of Conformity before the packaging is placed on the market, and to keep it — together with the technical documentation — for a defined retention period. By signing, the manufacturer "assumes responsibility for the compliance of the packaging" with all applicable requirements of Articles 5 to 12: restricted substances and the heavy-metal sum (Article 5, Annex V), recyclability grading (Article 6, Annex II), recycled content (Article 7), compostability where relevant (Article 8), minimisation (Article 10, Annex IV), reuse where applicable (Article 11), and labelling (Article 12). The Declaration is not a marketing statement; it is a legal attestation that a complete evidence base exists and has been assessed.

The trap for brand owners is the PPWR definition of "manufacturer." Under Article 3, the manufacturer is the natural or legal person who develops or has packaging manufactured under its own name or trademark. In practice, when a retailer's or brand's name appears on the pack, that brand is the manufacturer for PPWR purposes — even though a converter produced it. The consequence is direct: responsibility for the accuracy of the Declaration of Conformity generally rests with the brand owner, who must gather and validate supplier evidence rather than simply forwarding a converter PDF. Understanding where each obligation sits across your supplier chain is the first step to a defensible file.

The Annex VIII Model: Ten Mandatory Elements

Annex VIII sets out the model structure every Declaration must follow. It is short — a single page per packaging type — but each element is mandatory, and if one is missing the Declaration is invalid. The core elements are:

• A unique identification of the packaging (type, model, batch or a reference that traces to the technical file)
• The name and full address of the manufacturer and, where relevant, the authorised representative
• A statement that the Declaration is issued under the sole responsibility of the manufacturer
• The object of the Declaration — a description of the packaging sufficient for traceability
• The reference to Regulation (EU) 2025/40 and a statement of conformity with the applicable Articles 5 to 12
• References to the relevant harmonised standards used, or the alternative technical solutions where no harmonised standard yet covers a requirement
• The identity and signature of the person empowered to sign on behalf of the manufacturer
• The place and date of issue

A single Declaration may cover several packaging items, provided each item is identified and the Declaration remains traceable to its specific evidence. That flexibility is essential for a brand with thousands of SKUs — but it also means the mapping between a Declaration and the underlying data must be exact, because a market-surveillance authority can ask you to produce the technical file behind any one line. A ready-made, Annex VIII-shaped Declaration of Conformity template keeps every signed document consistent and audit-legible.

The Technical File Behind the DoC (Annex VII, Module A)

A Declaration is only as strong as the Annex VII technical documentation it rests on. PPWR uses the Module A "internal production control" conformity route: the manufacturer performs the assessment itself and holds the file, without third-party certification, unless a future implementing act says otherwise. The file must contain a general description of the packaging, its design and composition (materials, weights, layers, coatings, inks, adhesives), the results of the recyclability assessment against Annex II, evidence for recycled content and any substance-of-concern and heavy-metal checks under Annex V, the minimisation assessment under Annex IV, and the list of harmonised standards applied — or the alternative solutions adopted where standards are absent. Collecting documents is not the same as building this file: the evidence has to be assessed and internally consistent, which is where a structured recyclability assessment feeds directly into the Declaration.

Where Brand-Owner DoC Programmes Break

1. The supplier data chain is incomplete

The single biggest cause of an invalid Declaration is missing upstream evidence. A brand owner signing "under sole responsibility" needs, per packaging component, a supplier declaration covering material composition, the Annex V heavy-metal sum below 100 mg/kg, absence of intentionally added PFAS in food-contact packaging, the recyclability test basis, and recycled-content substantiation. Converters who can only supply a scanned brochure, not structured data, will slow the whole file. Start the supplier-data request cycle now — a request sent in July still has time to return before August 12; one sent in August does not.

2. Nobody has decided who signs

Annex VIII requires a named, empowered signatory. For a multi-entity group placing packaging across several markets, the question of which legal entity is the "manufacturer" — and therefore which director signs — is a governance decision, not a packaging-team detail. Non-EU brands compound this: if there is no EU-established manufacturer, an importer or an authorised representative inherits specific obligations, and the Declaration must name the right party. Resolve the signatory map before drafting a single Declaration.

3. Harmonised standards do not yet cover everything

Brand owners often assume they can simply cite a harmonised standard for each requirement. Many of the standards that will underpin PPWR — including the CEN EN 18120 design-for-recycling series published in April 2026 — are not yet cited in the Official Journal, and the Article 6(4) design-for-recycling delegated acts are not due until January 1, 2028. Until then, Annex VIII expressly allows citing the alternative technical solution adopted. The file must therefore document the method actually used (for example a recognised recyclability protocol), not a standard reference that does not yet exist.

4. One Declaration per packaging type — at portfolio scale

The obligation is per packaging type, not per company. A brand with a primary carton, a shrink film, a label and a shipper on one product already needs the evidence for four constructions, each traceable to its own Declaration line. Multiply across a catalogue and the exercise stops being a document task and becomes a data-management task. This is precisely where spreadsheets fail and where dedicated PPWR software earns its place — generating consistent, versioned Declarations from a single source of component data.

5. Retention and market surveillance are underestimated

The Declaration and technical file must be kept for five years after the last unit of single-use packaging is placed on the market, and ten years for reusable packaging. Market-surveillance authorities can demand the file in the language of the Member State concerned. A Declaration you cannot retrieve, or one whose supporting evidence has been overwritten by a later specification change, is functionally no Declaration at all. Version control and archiving are part of the obligation, not an afterthought.

A Practical Action Plan for Brand Owners

• Map the portfolio into packaging types. Break every product down into its constituent packaging constructions (primary, secondary, grouped, transport, e-commerce). Each type needs its own Declaration line and technical file.
• Fix the manufacturer and signatory per market now. Decide which legal entity is the PPWR manufacturer, confirm EU establishment or appoint an authorised representative for non-EU brands, and name the empowered signatory.
• Issue structured supplier-data requests immediately. For each component, demand composition, Annex V heavy-metal and PFAS declarations, recyclability basis and recycled-content evidence in a structured format — not a scanned PDF.
• Build the Annex VII file, then draw the Declaration from it. Assess recyclability against Annex II, complete the Annex IV minimisation rationale, and record the harmonised standards or alternative solutions used. The Declaration is the summary of an assessed file, not the file itself.
• Use the Annex VIII model verbatim. Check all ten mandatory elements are present on every signed Declaration; a single missing field invalidates it.
• Set up retention and versioning. Archive each Declaration with its evidence, keep five/ten-year retention, and lock a re-issue trigger whenever a specification changes.
• For the German market, align with VerpackG and LUCID. Brand owners placing packaging in Germany already register with the ZSVR (LUCID) and license through a dual system; the PPWR Declaration sits alongside — not instead of — those national duties, and the same component data feeds both.

How PPWR Connect Helps Brand Owners Own the Declaration

The Declaration of Conformity is where every PPWR obligation converges onto a single signed page, and for brand owners the hard part is not the page — it is assembling, assessing and retaining the evidence behind it across an entire catalogue. PPWR Connect gives brand owners one place to inventory every packaging type, collect structured supplier data, run the Annex II recyclability assessment and Annex IV minimisation check, generate consistent Annex VIII Declarations from that assessed data, and archive each Declaration with its technical file for the five- or ten-year retention window. If you want to know which of your SKUs already have a defensible Declaration and which are exposed with four weeks to go, start with a free PPWR readiness assessment — it maps your packaging against Articles 5 to 12 and shows exactly where the Declaration evidence is missing.