Trade up scheme

Where does anyone get the idea that the retailer is responsible for the recycling?  The recycling is expected to be done by the consumer.  

In Sonos’ T&C’s that have been sent to retailers. The customer brings in the old component and the retailer has to record and send off the S/N, then the retailer ‘recycles’ dumps the product

Not according to this (from Sonos rep Ryan S) (bold by me):

https://en.community.sonos.com/components-228996/sonos-contributing-to-electronic-waste-6831622#post16370458

We are prioritizing environmental responsibility and encourage our users to responsibly recycle their deactivated products through local e-recyclers. Lists of local certified e-recyclers can be found online, such as here: https://www.google.com/maps/search/e-waste+recycling

Certified e-recyclers adhere to sustainability policies and practices for managing electronics, including the reuse of materials, energy recovery and responsible disposal. Recycling locally is more eco-friendly and sustainable than packing up products and shipping them back to us. That said, our goal is to keep players out of the landfill, so if local recycling isn’t an option, customers are welcome to ship it back to Sonos at our expense.

Note also, Sonos will do the recycling if the consumer cannot recycle locally and they will pay for the shipping.  I guess this thread is all for naught. 

Recycling the older products is a condition of the agreement for receiving the discount, and recycling locally is more eco-friendly and sustainable than packing up and shipping back to us. According to the terms and conditions of the program outlined here: https://www.sonos.com/en-us/legal/tradeup-terms Emphasis added to the specific note.

[quote]

PRODUCT RECYCLING

ISSUANCE OF THE DISCOUNT CREDIT IS YOUR SOLE AND EXCLUSIVE CONSIDERATION FOR PLACING YOUR SONOS PRODUCT IN RECYCLE MODE. ONCE YOU HAVE INITIATED THE RECYCLING PROCESS AND RECEIVED YOUR DISCOUNT CREDIT IN THE “MY ACCOUNT” SECTION OF SONOS.COM, YOU SHOULD FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS IN THE TRADE UP TAB OF THE “MY ACCOUNT” SECTION TO SHIP YOUR PRODUCT BACK TO SONOS OR DELIVER THE PRODUCT TO A CERTIFIED ELECTRONICS RECYCLER FOLLOWING DEACTIVATION OF THE PRODUCT.

ONCE YOU HAVE INITIATED THE RECYCLING PROCESS, YOUR SONOS PRODUCT WILL NO LONGER BE USABLE. BY PARTICIPATING IN THE TRADE UP PROGRAM, YOU ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT YOUR SONOS PRODUCT WILL NO LONGER FUNCTION AS A SPEAKER OR NETWORK DEVICE AND DISCLAIM ANY WARRANTIES RELATED TO THE SONOS PRODUCT, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED, STATUTORY OR OTHERWISE, WITH RESPECT TO YOUR SONOS PRODUCTS, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NON-INFRINGEMENT AND THE IMPLIED CONDITION OF SATISFACTORY QUALITY. YOU AGREE THAT YOU WILL SHIP YOUR PRODUCT BACK TO SONOS OR RECYCLE YOUR SONOS PRODUCT WITH A CERTIFIED ELECTRONICS RECYCLER WITHIN TWENTY-ONE DAYS OF INITIATION OF THE RECYCLING PROCESS.

[/quote]

There are also retailers that are participating in this program. They handle the process slightly differently, but they are also required to recycle the products responsibly, per our agreement with them.

Clearly you missed the point of this thread. Sonos are encouraging people to recycle items that don't rneed recycling. As Ryan has already said, shipping items back to them is also not an environmental friendly option. Recycling is great but not for the sake of it. That's the point.

Uh, since when is recycling a bad thing?  Also, if you don't want them recycled, don't participate in the program.  You do have a choice.

My previous post was only a few sentences long so not sure how you still missed my point. I'll try and reword it for clarity.

1) Recycling is a good thing. Recycling things that don't need recycling is a bad thing.

2) To add to that, people do have a choice but Sonos is encouraging bad practice (see point 1)

Hope that helps.

Cheers

Exactly. When it comes to sustainability, re-use trumps recycling.

A Sonos speaker needs recycling when it no longer functions. At that point Sonos will likely not be able to remotely disable it, so you will lose out on 30% discount.

Bricking a perfectly re-usable Sonos just to recycle it is not a sustainability practice. It is a practice to sell more units. Saying that you would like to make sure that people new to Sonos get “the best possible experience” is also a thinly veiled way of saying “we prefer to sell new units”. I have no problem with for-profit, publicly traded companies trying to maximize their profit, but I'd rather they be upfront about it instead of disguising it as some sort of noble gesture.

Regarding the “shipping has an even bigger impact”, true, but I doubt many people are actually going to take the trouble of taking their old equipment to be responsibly recycled. Most of them will end up as landfill. So in that case, yes, I'd rather have some way to guarantee local recycling, or pay to ship it to Sonos.

The only real benefit I can see here is when Sonos inevitably comes to the point where they can no longer support the older devices because their hardware will not support any further developments in the firmware. Then, if and when the functionality of the ecosystem is has evolved to a point where my gen1 Play 5s have become effectively useless, I might consider having them disabled to buy newer units at a discount.

So indeed, I have a choice, and for the reasons mentioned above I will not participate in it, until there is no other viable option for my hardware. This is my personal use case of course. I do agree that if an older player ends up in a closet for years (but why?), only to be thrown out later, then it is better to recycle it and trade up.

These units are more than a decade old in some cases.  People are going to buy new stuff anyway. Encouraging them to recycle 10+ year old devices rather than pitch them out is far better than Apple encouraging you to toss your phone and buy the new model once every year.    As to “recycling things that do not need recycling”, let’s face it: These decade old devices aren’t going to run forever, and a recycling offer is more than most electronics companies offer for near end-of-life units.  Good of Sonos to get out ahead of it. 

@Ryan S 

The insert shows products that are eligible for the 30% discount coupon through BestBuy. I find it odd that the Play 3 and Play 1 (especially the Play 1) are missing from the BB list of eligible products.

Question (I realize you may not be able to comment on anything):

1. Why would Sonos leave those products off the list?
2. Did retailers decide (with Sonos blessing)  which products they will accept?
3. Did retailers decide (with Sonos blessing) not to include products for which they still have inventory to sell 

Note: Just an observation...there seems to be several threads on this topic. Why not combine into one?

Cheers!