from redundancy to recycling
Imagine living on the 19th floor of a newly refurbished apartment block with stunning views over Salford, Manchester, The Pennines, and beyond. The ever-changing Northwest weather offers a daily spectacle of nature at its best.
However, the sights in the basement of this 19-storey block were far from impressive: overflowing bins, bags of rubbish on the floor, and the pervasive smell of rotting food. The bins would be full long before collection day and overflowing again soon after.
As both a resident and the Lead for Enterprise & Innovation for the landlord, I saw firsthand the significant costs and issues arising from these overflowing bins. Determined to find a solution, I started investigating the bin store in my building.
I noticed that many of the black bags on top of the bins looked large and heavy but were filled mostly with air. Squashing these bags down would create much more space. In communal bin areas, people are reluctant to touch others' rubbish, leading to bins that are full by capacity but not by weight.
After researching the weight capacity of the bins and equipment that could compact their contents, I found a machine designed for this purpose. However, it required mains electricity, space and an onsite caretaker to operate it onsite, which wasn't practical for every block. This sparked an idea: what if this machine could be mobile, traveling from block to block? And so, the concept of a mobile compacting service was born.
Within six months, I turned this idea into reality, installing a compactor into a van and hiring two operatives for a 12-month pilot project. Our goal was to reduce the environmental impact of overflowing bins and the cost of excess waste removal for 2,000 residents.
Twelve months later, the project reported savings of over £150,000 for the organisation and reduced residents' service charges as a direct result. It even saved time for the local authority collection operatives as they didn’t have to remove excess waste from on top of and around the bins. In 2021, the Board extended the project into an internal service, which continues to this day.
After nearly a decade of service, I was made redundant during an organisational restructure. Seizing the opportunity, I decided to further develop the concept with a patent pending modification and commercialise this service myself. Two months later, Squosh was born as the UK’s first mobile compacting service for communal bins, with the NHS as our first customer and housing following soon after. Today, Squosh is an award-winning service offering franchises across the UK. From redundancy to recycling, our journey has only just begun. Watch this space for more updates!
Our ideal customers are users of communal-sized bins that reach capacity before collection day. If this sounds like your situation, contact us to see how our innovative mobile compacting service can help reduce costs, minimise environmental impact, and improve overall waste management efficiency.
