Economic-Operator Roles

This page summarises Regulation (EU) 2025/40 and the European Commission’s FAQ and describes how Polygon One works with them. It is not legal advice. The Commission FAQ is interpretive guidance and binds neither national authorities nor courts. Check your specific case with your legal counsel.

Overview

The PPWR (Regulation (EU) 2025/40) ties every duty to a role: whoever manufactures, imports, or distributes packaging has a different set of tasks. In Polygon One you set the role per packaging unit — from it, the platform automatically derives the matching obligation checklist.

The same company can hold different roles for different packaging: for the transport packaging you assemble yourself you are the manufacturer, for the imported product packaging you are the importer. That is why the role is set per unit, not per company.

The roles at a glance

Role	Core duties under PPWR	What Polygon One does for it
Manufacturer	Full conformity duty: conformity assessment (Module A, Art. 38), technical documentation (Annex VII), EU Declaration of Conformity (Annex VIII, Art. 39), marking (Art. 15). Who counts as the manufacturer depends on the packaging — see the three cases below the table.	Derives the full obligation checklist, collects evidence per component, and generates the Declaration of Conformity from your data.
Importer	Places third-country packaging on the EU market (Art. 18). Must ensure that the third-country manufacturer carried out the conformity assessment (Art. 38) and drew up the Declaration of Conformity, that the Art. 15(5)/(6) marking requirements are complied with, and that the packaging is accompanied by the required documents. Retains the Declaration of Conformity and the Annex VII technical documentation: 5 years for single-use, 10 years for reusable packaging (Art. 18(7)). Additionally indicates its own name, postal address, and — where available — electronic means of communication on the packaging or, where that is not possible, on an accompanying document.	Shows the Collect & retain duty for the Declaration of Conformity, tracks the verification status of collected declarations, and reminds you about the importer identity for marking.
Distributor	Makes packaging available on the market without being manufacturer or importer (Art. 19). No Declaration of Conformity duty — neither to collect nor to retain. But: distributors too may only make compliant packaging available — the Commission reads Art. 15(1) as placing that obligation on the whole chain of manufacturers, importers, and distributors (Commission FAQ X.1). Before making the packaging available, it checks: that the EPR producer is entered in the producer register (Art. 44), that the packaging is marked (Art. 12), and that the producer and importer have affixed their identity details (Art. 15(5)/(6) and Art. 18(3)). A distributor who becomes aware of non-compliance must inform the authorities (Art. 19(5)) — in every Member State concerned, where one warehouse serves several national markets.	Derives the due-care checklist (marking, producer registration, optionally a collected declaration). The Declaration of Conformity is shown as informational and never triggers action needed; collecting it stays available as an optional action.
Authorised representative	EU-established, under written mandate from a (often non-EU) manufacturer (Art. 17). May also draw up the EU Declaration of Conformity within the mandate. Holds the Declaration of Conformity and technical documentation; liaises with market-surveillance authorities. It may not draw up the technical documentation itself, and legal responsibility stays with the manufacturer.	Tracks the Declaration of Conformity to be kept on file, like the other collect roles.
Supplier	Supplies packaging or materials to the manufacturer and provides all information and evidence needed to demonstrate conformity (Art. 16) — material data, substance and recycled-content declarations. Does not draw up a Declaration of Conformity.	Tracks the substance duties (heavy metals, PFAS) on an evidence basis; no Declaration of Conformity duty.
Fulfilment service provider	Stores, packs, or ships packaging in e-commerce on behalf of others (Art. 20). Ensures handling and storage do not jeopardise conformity.	The platform tracks no evidence duties for this role.

Who is the manufacturer? Three cases

The manufacturer role (Art. 3(1)(13)) does not hang on who operates the machine, but on who decides the packaging design. The European Commission distinguishes three cases:

Case	The manufacturer is …
Packaging bears a name or trademark	The economic operator under whose name or trademark the packaging is placed on the market — even where another operator physically manufactures or fills it. Where that operator is a micro-enterprise and the supplier is established in the same member state, the supplier is the manufacturer (Commission FAQ II.6). What decides is who determines the packaging design: a licensor whose trademark merely appears on the packaging, without determining its characteristics, is not automatically the manufacturer — this has to be assessed case by case on the basis of the contractual arrangement (FAQ II.7).
Unbranded, generic packaging	Whoever physically makes it. Examples: the business that physically makes plain standardised cardboard boxes, or the stretch wrap sold on the roll.
Custom-made packaging bearing no name or trademark	The ordering company — because it places the order and decides the design specifications.

The most commonly missed case: custom-made packaging. If you order cartons from a packaging producer to your own specifications, you are the manufacturer of that packaging under the PPWR — even without your name or brand printed on it, and even when it is pure transport packaging. The decisive criterion is who places the order and decides the design specifications. The producing company is then your supplier and must provide you with the necessary technical documentation (Art. 16). So set the role for such units to Manufacturer, not Distributor.

What can be delegated — and what cannot

The manufacturer is the sole economic operator bearing legal responsibility for the packaging’s compliance with the sustainability and labelling requirements — regardless of who actually drafted the Declaration of Conformity (Commission FAQ X.1). That responsibility cannot be transferred by contract. Only individual tasks can be delegated:

Task	Delegable?
Conformity assessment (Art. 38)	Yes — the manufacturer may carry it out itself or have it carried out on its behalf, e.g. by a laboratory or a certification scheme (Art. 15(2)).
Drawing up the EU Declaration of Conformity (Art. 39)	Yes — by an authorised representative appointed under a written mandate (Art. 17). Responsibility for its correctness stays with the manufacturer.
Drawing up the technical documentation (Annex VII)	No. This obligation cannot be delegated; the manufacturer must assume it itself (Art. 17).
Keeping documents and making them available to authorities	Yes — an authorised representative may keep the Declaration of Conformity and technical documentation at the disposal of the national authorities (Art. 17(2)).
Legal responsibility	Never transferable — not even by contractual arrangement.

Setting the role in the app

The role is set in the packaging unit form, in the Classification section:

Open the packaging unit

Navigate to Packaging units and open the unit you want (or create a new one — see Packaging units).

Select the role

Under Economic-operator role, select the applicable role. Below the select, the app shows a short description of the chosen role.

Role selection in the Classification section of the packaging unit

Check the extra switches (importer/distributor only)

For the importer and distributor roles, two additional switches appear: Placed under own brand and Modified affecting conformity — they control the Art. 21 reclassification (see below).

Save

After saving, the app immediately re-derives the unit’s obligation checklist.

Art. 21: when an importer or distributor counts as a manufacturer

Art. 21 PPWR: if you place imported or distributed packaging on the market under your own brand, or modify it in a way affecting conformity, you take on the full manufacturer duties. The app models exactly that: enable either of the two switches Placed under own brand or Modified affecting conformity on an importer or distributor unit, and the unit is treated as a manufacturer for the obligation checklist. The checklist then shows the notice:

Treated as a manufacturer under Art. 21 (own-brand or modified packaging) — the full conformity duties apply.

Art. 21 notice in the obligation checklist of a reclassified unit

Concretely this means: instead of merely collecting the Declaration of Conformity, you now have to generate it yourself — including conformity assessment and technical documentation.

An own-brand import is the most commonly overlooked case: whoever sources packaging from a third country and sells it under their own brand name is legally the manufacturer — with all the duties that entails.

Micro-enterprises: the Art. 15(12) duty shift

If your company is a micro-enterprise and sources its packaging from a supplier in the EU, the manufacturer role can sit with that supplier. Polygon One reflects this once you have answered the self-attestation with Yes. Where you set it: Settings → PPWR, the PPWR conformity defaults card, the field Micro-enterprise self-attestation with its three answers Not answered, Yes — we meet the definition and No — we do not meet the definition. The hint below the field names the yardstick:

Use the definition in Recommendation 2003/361/EC as applicable on 11 February 2025. This only changes Art. 21 responsibility when an own-brand or modifying importer/distributor has a packaging supplier located in the EU.

When the shift takes effect: on a unit with the role Manufacturer and the Placed under own brand switch on, whose supplier sits in an EU member state — that is, in the own-brand case, not for a physical self-manufacturer. The unit’s Obligations tab then shows one of two notes, depending on where the supplier sits:

The supplier sits …	Note on the Obligations tab
in another EU member state	”Art. 15(12) micro-enterprise shift applied: because you are a micro-enterprise and the packaging is supplied to you from another EU member state, your supplier carries the Art. 15 manufacturer duties — declaration of conformity, technical documentation and marking. Obtain and retain your supplier’s documentation; you remain responsible for your EPR registrations.”
in the same member state as your establishment	”Art. 15(12) micro-enterprise shift applied: your packaging supplier is established in the same member state as you, so it is both the manufacturer and the producer for this packaging. The Art. 15 duties — declaration of conformity, technical documentation and marking — and the EPR producer registration in your own member state fall on the supplier. Obtain and retain your supplier’s documentation; registrations for other markets you sell into are unaffected.”

What decides the second row is your company’s establishment country as recorded in the settings. If it is not set, the first note always appears — even when your supplier really is in the same member state. The three affected duties — Declaration of Conformity, conformity assessment and marking — do not disappear from the catalogue. They stay listed, are carried as Not assessed, and gain the addition:

Carried by your supplier (Art. 15(12)) — obtain and retain its documentation rather than drawing up your own.

The self-attestation is a statement by your company, not a check by Polygon One. Whether you meet the definition is for you to judge against the recommendation named in the hint.

”Producer” in the EPR sense is a separate role

The PPWR distinguishes two concepts that are easily confused:

Manufacturer (Art. 3(1)(13)): draws up and signs the Declaration of Conformity — the role from the table above.
Producer (Art. 3(1)(15), EPR): makes packaging available for the first time on the territory of a Member State and therefore carries extended producer responsibility — registration (Art. 44), reporting, fees. In Germany this runs via LUCID/ZSVR.

The EPR producer status applies per Member State and is independent of the conformity role: a distributor can also be an EPR producer. In the app you set it via the Producer (EPR) switch in the same form section — it appears for the manufacturer, importer, and distributor roles. When it is active and the unit has market Member States recorded, the app adds the EPR registration duty for those Member States to the unit’s checklist.

EPR registration

How Polygon One guides you through registration in the national producer registers (e.g. LUCID).

Next steps

Obligation checklist

Which duties the app derives from the role and what the statuses mean.

Declaration of Conformity

Generate (manufacturer) or collect (importer/authorised representative) — depending on the role; optional for distributors as due-care evidence.

Overview

Master Data (Stage 1)

Roles & Obligations (Stage 2)

Data Collection (Stage 3)

Documentation (Stage 4)

Reuse

EPR & Volume Reporting

What suppliers see

Overview

The roles at a glance

Who is the manufacturer? Three cases

What can be delegated — and what cannot

Setting the role in the app

Art. 21: when an importer or distributor counts as a manufacturer

Micro-enterprises: the Art. 15(12) duty shift

”Producer” in the EPR sense is a separate role

EPR registration

Next steps

Obligation checklist

Declaration of Conformity

​Overview

​The roles at a glance

​Who is the manufacturer? Three cases

​What can be delegated — and what cannot

​Setting the role in the app

​Art. 21: when an importer or distributor counts as a manufacturer

​Micro-enterprises: the Art. 15(12) duty shift

​”Producer” in the EPR sense is a separate role

EPR registration

​Next steps

Obligation checklist

Declaration of Conformity

Overview

The roles at a glance

Who is the manufacturer? Three cases

What can be delegated — and what cannot

Setting the role in the app

Art. 21: when an importer or distributor counts as a manufacturer

Micro-enterprises: the Art. 15(12) duty shift

”Producer” in the EPR sense is a separate role

Next steps