Christmas is a busy time of year for most businesses. Shops, restaurants, and pubs experience an influx of customers as offices simultaneously throw Christmas parties and celebrations while also wrapping up for the year. With so much going on it’s easy to overlook business basics, such as managing waste.
In the UK, we produce around 30% more waste over the Christmas holidays compared to other times of the year. This includes homes and businesses throwing out extra food, decorations, and other items. The bank holidays and many people having time off work can also affect waste collection schedules.
Planning for the impact of Christmas on your commercial waste helps prevent overflowing bins, paying for collections you don’t need, or entering the new year with a waste problem for your organisation. Use the following actions to ensure waste management runs smoothly for your business over the festive period.
Prepare for extra waste
It’s estimated that households and businesses create an additional three million tonnes of waste at Christmas. That’s on top of all the regular rubbish we produce from running companies and living our daily lives. Your business should first forecast how much more waste it will generate over the festive period.
This could be more food waste from Christmas lunches and treats in an office, extra glass wine and beer bottles from restaurants and bars, or cards and decorations when the festivities are finished. Restaurants, bars, and shops especially are likely to create extra waste and can use previous experiences to predict increases in volumes.
Use the estimates of additional festive waste to arrange bigger or more bins, or to increase collection frequencies over Christmas. This should ensure you can store all the extra rubbish your business produces and that it’s managed efficiently. It avoids any overflowing bins or waste piling up on site that could otherwise cause a problem.
Anticipate changes to collections
Many councils change bin collection days for households in their areas across the Christmas bank holidays. And private waste collection firms also adapt their schedules over the festive period. Your waste collection company should inform you of any changes but if not you should check so you can prepare.
In most cases, it may only be that your usual waste collections are moved forward or pushed back a couple of days. The types and volumes of waste materials your organisation produces may affect any changes. For example, hospitals that continue to produce clinical and hazardous waste might not experience a change in collections.
Make sure you know any new collection dates and times over Christmas to avoid missing a collection. Should your business close then it’s vital you either inform your waste collectors or move bins to the pickup point before you shut. Otherwise, it could lead to a pointless and costly trip, or your bins not being emptied if there’s no access.
Reduce waste over the holidays
Sadly, more than 100 million sacks of rubbish end up in landfills every Christmas. Lots of this comes from households but businesses also create mountains more waste during the festive season. To save money and help the environment companies of all sizes and industries can play their part to cut down on waste levels at Christmas.
A few ways to reduce Christmas waste for any business are to:
- Plan accurately – it’s easy to get excited and carried away planning workplace Christmas decorations, parties, and other celebrations that lead to lots of avoidable waste. Estimate the numbers and amounts of food, decorations, and items you’ll need closely to minimise waste, leftovers, and costs.
- Give zero-waste gifts – cut down on waste when giving gifts to clients and staff with items that come in recyclable and minimal packaging. There are all sorts of low-waste Christmas gift options available, such as tickets to shows, sporting, and music events or sustainable food and clothing items.
- Arrange sustainable disposal – creating waste is inevitable at Christmas but avoid sending any of it to landfills. Choose sustainable disposal methods like composting for food waste and Christmas trees.
- Donate items – offer any unwanted items and things your business can’t reuse to charities and community groups. This could be Christmas decorations you don’t have space to store, old electronics that have been upgraded and replaced, or even food.
- Recycle rubbish – many businesses generate extra packaging waste over the holiday season. Much of this is recyclable such as glass, paper, cardboard, and plastics. Use separate bins to reduce contamination risks and ensure as much as possible is recycled.
Book free festive bins
Enjoy smooth and stress-free management of your commercial waste at Christmas with Divert. We can provide free bins for your business with no delivery or hire fees – you only pay for collections. Choose from a wide range of sizes to separate and store all the waste materials you produce.
We divert all rubbish away from landfill for a sustainable solution, as our name suggests. Bespoke waste services mean we can provide extra bins and adapt pickups to suit your busy festive period. Great communication and customer care ensure everything goes to plan when it comes to managing your waste at Christmas.
Call 0333 444 0118 or contact us online today for your free quote and to find out more about how we can help your business manage its waste this Christmas.
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