Tesco is to introduce collection bins for clothes hangers in stores in its aim to prevent 1,000 tonnes of plastic going into landfill.

Tesco trialled the bins in five stores and will now roll out a national collection scheme for all shoppers’ unwanted clothes hangers.

Clothing technical manager Alan Wragg said: “Last year, we estimate that our customers took home over 150 million Tesco hangers. Although many of these will have been put to good use, we feared that a significant number were ending up in the bin.

By letting our customers know that we will send their unwanted hangers back to our suppliers, we estimate that over 1,000 tonnes of plastic will be spared from landfill in the first year alone.”

The hangers will be returned to Tesco’s suppliers in Asia in containers that would otherwise be travelling empty. They will be reused and any damaged hangers will be ground down and recycled into new hangers.

The hanger initiative will help Tesco cut the packaging on its products by 25 per cent by 2010.