The Impact of Cardboard Balers in the Supermarket Sector

Machinery for baling cardboard can have multiple advantages for a wide range of businesses. The supermarket sector, in particular, is one which benefits from a baler due to the high volume of cardboard that they need to dispose of on a daily basis. Some of the main potential benefits of balers include:

1. Bringing in extra revenue.
2. Minimising safety hazards.
3. Increasing usable space.
4. Reducing the environmental impact of the business.

Here, we take a closer look at how balers can reduce waste management costs, and how baling cardboard can help promote health and safety in the workplace.

The Benefits Of Cardboard Balers

The advantages of cardboard balers are multifold. They enable businesses to efficiently manage cardboard waste by compressing it into compact bales, which saves space and reduces storage and transportation costs. Additionally, cardboard balers promote eco-friendly practices by facilitating recycling, contributing to a sustainable waste management system.

How Cardboard Balers Reduce Waste Management Costs

Cardboard balers can significantly lower waste management expenses, which can be quite substantial in the supermarket sector. Cardboard is the material which represents the largest proportion of waste in supermarkets, typically accounting for around 80% of the waste among most food retailers. Cardboard is also the most widely generated type of waste, representing just over 40% of all waste in the EU in 2019. This was followed by plastic, in second place, with 19.4%.

In the UK alone, over 2.5 million tonnes of paper and cardboard are used each year, and this is only expected to rise. The cost of processing this waste can have a major influence on the business's operating costs, but there are ways to minimise this. In fact, utilising a cardboard baler is predicted to help firms save an average of £1248 per year.

Removing the Need for Skips and Bins

Supermarkets, who aren’t yet using balers, will typically be filling up large bins or skips with cardboard waste. This raises a number of problems, such as the cardboard not being compacted, which necessitates emptying the bins far more frequently than is actually necessary. Having skips and bins emptied is costly, and the more space the waste takes up, the more it will cost to have it removed. Using a cardboard baler can reduce or even avoid the need to have bins and skips on site, freeing up space and removing the associated costs.

Limiting waste removal transportation

With the rising cost of fuel, the more trips necessary to empty a skip will result in higher waste management costs. However, because cardboard balers compress waste into smaller, easier-to-handle bales, fewer trips are necessary to remove the bales from the site, which lowers transportation costs.

Creating new revenue streams

As well as minimising waste removal costs, balers can create a new stream of revenue. The price you can sell a tonne of cardboard bales for varies from month to month, ranging anywhere between £35 to £125. For supermarkets, this can be very lucrative, since they can produce thousands of tonnes of cardboard waste each year.

Promoting health and safety using cardboard balers

Balers are a much more efficient and effective way to manage and dispose of cardboard waste, and they also offer a solution that protects workers against health and safety hazards.

Keeping space clear

A baler crushes cardboard into compact bales, which takes up significantly less space than loose waste. This helps to keep clear up valuable space in the warehouses, making it safer for workers to move around. When cardboard boxes are not obstructing sight lines or creating narrow pathways in a warehouse, it becomes a much safer place to work, with fewer risks to staff.

Removing trip hazards

In supermarket warehouses, it's not unusual to find bins and skips overflowing with cardboard boxes. A supermarket generates an enormous amount of cardboard waste, which is challenging to manage. A recycling baler eliminates this issue by compacting cardboard waste down into manageable bales. These can then be stacked and stored safely until they get taken away from site, avoiding stacking it in walkways or aisles and preventing potential trip hazards for workers.