Waste Management Solutions for Leisure & Events – Keeping Venues Clean and Green

Whether it’s day-to-day operations or you’re hosting an event, it’s important that your leisure facility knows how to handle waste in an efficient and compliant way. In peak seasons, you may find that the volume of waste generated by patrons increases significantly. 

Staying on top of the extra waste is essential for keeping your fitness centre, theme park, health club, or other leisure facility clean, tidy, and pleasant for customers. The right protocols will also ensure your business complies with regulations and can help keep your landfill tax down.

Read on for our helpful event waste management tips, and remember that you can always count on phs Wastekit to keep your leisure facilities equipped with state-of-the-art balers and compactors.

What types of waste are generated in leisure facilities?

From summer holidays to the festive period, you may find that your facility sees higher footfall at certain times of the year. In some cases, this is due to hosting seasonal events, or it may be down to school holidays. 

Either way, it’s wise to be prepared for the surge in waste generation from a range of sources, including:

• Bottles, cans, and snack packaging from vending machines
• Food, drink, and packaging waste from cafe areas
• Delivery packaging, including cardboard boxes and plastic wrap
• Packaging from cleaning products
• Textile waste from old towels, uniforms, and linen
• Sanitary waste from washrooms
• Green waste from any garden maintenance in outdoor areas
• Paper and confidential waste from reception desks and office areas

How can leisure facilities manage peak season waste efficiently?

If you have an event planned or are anticipating a busy season, here are some of our top leisure and event waste management tips to help you deal with extra refuse and recycling.

1. Conduct a wastesaving audit and plan accordingly: Before planning for a waste surge, you need to know what your baseline waste generation is. Our experts can carry out a Wastesaving Audit to identify your current waste types, systems, and potential improvements. This information can help you plan for increased waste volumes, whether due to a one-off event or peak period.

2. Ensure clear signage for bins: Clear signs for refuse and recycling bins can help customers, visitors, and staff separate waste streams at the source. This, in turn, makes handling different types faster and easier.

Common types of waste you’ll need to separate include:

• Dry mixed recyclables (including paper, cardboard, plastic, and cans)
• Glass
• Food waste
• Single-use items, such as napkins, coffee cups, and straws
• Washroom waste (including sanitary waste)

3. Consider water refill stations: Hydration is critical, especially in leisure facilities where many patrons may be active and require easy access to drinking water. Opting for large water coolers, taps, and refill stations can encourage facility users to top up their existing bottles, rather than getting new, single-use products from vending machines. 

4. Encourage the use of reusable cups: Similarly, it can be helpful to offer an incentive (such as an extra stamp on a loyalty card or money off each drink) for customers to bring reusable coffee cups when refuelling in cafe areas. This can reduce the number of single-use receptacles you need to sort when managing bins and recycling. 

5. Utilise compactors and balers: We know that space can be a limiting factor for many leisure facilities. Compactors and balers compress waste into smaller bundles, so you can get the most out of your bins and keep your landfill tax low. 

Our portable compactors, in particular, have a small footprint, making them an excellent choice when storage space is limited. They also allow you to move around, which can be ideal for venues split over multiple floors.

We offer:

• Cardboard balers, which are great for dealing with a surge of stock packaging.
• Plastic balers, which can compress PET bottles and similar vending machine waste.
• Multi-chamber balers to help you deal with various waste streams in one machine.
• Glass crushers which safely reduce the size of glass bottles, whether you’re hosting an event serving alcohol or managing premium soft drink waste.

You can rent our balers and compactors to support your waste management efforts during events or busy periods. Alternatively, you can buy the equipment to ensure you have access to efficient industry waste solutions all year round.

6. Schedule baling and compacting in off-peak hours: By using your balers, compactors, or other waste equipment in off-peak hours (usually 10pm–8am), you can make the most of lower energy tariffs. Managing waste at this time also frees up staff to support customers in peak hours.