They roll them out from £1.30 a pop and retail hundreds every hour across the UK – and now you can take them back when they're no longer needed.

In a bid to bin the headache of what to do with our endless supply of old plastic plant pots – given that many kerbside recycling schemes don't accept them – Britain's biggest DIY chain B&Q is launching pot recycling points across 100 of its stores.

The move follows a similar change made recently by rival Dobbies garden centre chain amid industry calculations that up to half a billion pots and seed trays end up in landflll or incineration in the UK every year.

Owned by Kingfisher (which also has the Screwfix brand) and with three Gloucestershire stores in Cheltenham, Gloucester and Stroud, B&Q says the move is already up and running in its Gloucester store in St Oswalds Retail Park.

Samantha Dyer, B&Q head of quality and sustainability, told Punchline-Gloucester.com: "As a business, we want to make a positive difference through tangible actions and continue to put innovation at the forefront of our approach to helping our customers make more sustainable choices.

 "These new recycling stations will allow us to repurpose something that would normally be discarded and help us in our goal to make more sustainable choices easier and more convenient for our customers."

Customers dropping pots dropped at B&Q's Gloucestershire stores will be able to buy the recycled product in the form of a planter, which will retail at £4.

A spokesperson for B&Q added: "The new Blacksmith Planter pot created from the recycled pots, willbe available to purchase from B&Q stores. The pots are made using 100% recycled plastic, are all-weather resistant and made in the UK."

They added that the initiative is "in line with the concept of the closed-loop circular economy, which seeks to promote resource efficiency and minimise waste by designing products and systems with recycling and sustainability in mind".