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BrightHouse, the leading UK rent-to-own retailer, today announces an update on its Recycling Plan. In 2008, the company was the UK winner of the Green Apple Awards For Environmental Best Practice.
Introduced in 2007, the recycling plan aims to ensure that the company’s end of life packaging is turned into product for the commercial recycling market place. With the support of store colleagues, employees, suppliers and customers, the company now operates a “zero tolerance” towards the recycling of end of life packaging.
The plan also aims to minimise the amount of material that BrightHouse sends to landfill. In particular, this means sending goods deemed “Beyond Economic Repair” goods to the company’s National Distribution Centre in Manchester for processing and recycling.
Summary
– Annualised savings generated by the programme now forecasts to run at £300,000.
– BrightHouse will process over 590 tonnes of mixed waste this year, up from 322 tonnes in 2008/09. This includes: metals, glass, paper, cardboard, plastic, and polystyrene.
– Waste going to landfill will have been reduced by over 80% by the end of 09/10.
– Transport related carbon emissions have been reduced by the development of a paperless system that manages load planning, route planning and tracking via satellite navigation. Our transport fleet has been upgraded so that our trailers can haul roughly 30% extra volume per trip reducing the potential number of extra trips and fuel costs.
– Wasted trips have also been cut by deployment of a pre-call / SMS notification system to customers on the day before delivery, on delivery day and 20 minutes before arrival.
– From our warehouse, we provide recycled grain storage bags to our shops and service centres. These bags are used to store separated waste which is then transported back to Manchester. Once they have reached the end of their life these bags are then further recycled.
– Shredding paperwork, the company now recycles approximately 120 additional tonnes of paper waste a year.
Leo McKee, Chief Executive, said: “BrightHouse takes its environmental responsibilities very seriously. We are making practical, deliverable changes in order to improve the way we operate. These actions also make good economic sense. An initial £120,000 investment now will save the Company around £300,000 per year, allowing us to run our recycling centre in Manchester at zero net cost. The programme is ongoing and we will continue to make further improvements.
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