How Europe is killing makers and micro-entrepreneurs
The European Union's new Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) is creating significant administrative burdens for small-scale hardware makers and micro-entrepreneurs. Because the regulation requires compliance in every individual member state, small businesses struggle to afford the costs of selling across the EU.
Why it matters
It highlights the unintended consequences of broad environmental regulations on small-scale innovation and the maker economy.
Lectronz is a marketplace for open-source hardware makers and DIY electronics. Most of our sellers are not factories or well-funded start-ups. They are engineers, independent designers, and hardware enthusiasts working from spare rooms, garages, and tiny workshops.
Some earn a living from their products. Some sell only a handful of boards each year. Others build ten units simply because they created something useful and want to share it with the community. Occasionally, one of those experiments grows into a real business. Every Arduino begins somewhere.
But the European Union's new packaging rules now threaten to kill the world of makers and micro-entrepreneurs, putting jobs, livelihoods and an entire ecosystem of innovation at risk.
And this threat is not just limited to makers and engineers. It affects artists, craftspeople and other micro-entrepreneurs selling their work across the EU.
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