Every day millions of cardboard boxes are used to transport car parts, raw ingredients, or maybe even wedding dresses. Once unpacked they are simply cast aside, ready for the recycling baler. But should industry be treating cardboard as a single use item?

If you’re a medium to large business it’s quite likely you produce cardboard boxes as a ‘waste’ product of your production process. You’ve probably invested in a baling machine to process this unwanted cardboard. All cardboard gets crushed in the baler and collected regularly by a recycling company. But the process of getting cardboard to the baler, baling it and getting it collected is time consuming and expensive. Staff must be trained and the machines must be maintained. Could there be a better solution?

Implement a Reuse Model

Reuseabox can help you manage your cardboard waste and optimise its value. We help you to segregate your waste at source into reusable and recyclable cardboard. We work alongside your waste or recycling company so it doesn’t matter if you are already in a contract.

By implementing a reuse model you can optimise your value from waste and improve your waste handling efficiency processes.

How does it work?

Reusable lines of cardboard boxes are identified and segregated from the waste stream. These boxes are sorted and palletised at source resulting in as little labour as possible. Any boxes that cannot be reused are baled and the traditional method of recycling is maintained. We provide on-site training for staff if required.

Benefits include:

–          Increased efficiencies

–          Certainty – reuse rate is fixed and will not fluctuate

–          Reduced handling and labour costs

–          Environmental benefits

–          Increased revenue from waste

Sustainability

All businesses must embrace more sustainable practises if they are to stay profitable. Mark Carney, the Bank of England governor has recently warned that businesses who ignore climate crisis will go bankrupt.

Diverting cardboard boxes to reuse is a relatively simple way of improving your sustainability outcomes. It is clear that a traditional linear economy, a ‘take, make, waste’ model is no longer acceptable for businesses. Instead, we must adopt a more circular approach where materials are kept in use for longer and waste is effectively designed out. Whilst recycling has its place, it should only be used as a last resort when a material can no longer be reused.

By delaying the recycling process and reusing cardboard boxes, we can save vast amounts of energy and water, whilst preventing the release of copious volumes of CO2. Most importantly, for every 7 pallets of cardboard boxes that are reused instead of recycled, an incredible 17 trees are saved.

Take a look at how this company streamlined their waste management process by implementing a reuse model:

Case Study:

A distribution centre was producing large volumes of cardboard boxes. As the boxes were unpacked, warehouse staff were instructed to flatten the box and place it into a trolley. The trolley could hold around 25 boxes. Once full, this trolley was then wheeled to the waste area where the boxes were taken out and put into a baler. When the baling machine was full, an employee operated the machine and when a bale was produced another employee used a forklift truck to drive the bale to another area of the site and place the bale into a storage trailer.

Reuseabox identified 90% of the boxes as suitable for a reuse model. They advised on segregating the reusable boxes at source to minimise labour. For the new process, warehouse staff unpacked the boxes as before, but all reusable boxes were unfolded and placed on a pallet. 100 boxes could be stacked on each pallet, which was then secured with pallet strapping. Once secured, a forklift truck picked up 2 pallets at a time and moved the pallets into a storage trailer.

The client was impressed to discover that this process saved considerable time and cost. Not only could the pallets hold 4 times as many boxes as the trollies, the boxes themselves were handled a minimum amount of times to streamline the process.

How to find out more

If you’d like to find out how a Reuse Model could benefit your company, send us an email:

Info@Reuseabox.co.uk