07. The More I Practice
Global Recycling
One of the greatest feelings in business is receiving an order for a product or service from a customer. (It is an even better feeling when they pay – but that is a story for another day).
What if you could find a way to sell the same product not once, or even twice but multiple times? As well as reducing landfill waste? And providing benefits back to the customer?
This was the challenge that we set ourselves as we built a fully functioning global recycling network.
The client was a retail security business that wanted to build a network capable of enabling retailers to cut in store operational costs by applying security tags at source, improving speed of merchandise on-sale availability by removing processes from the store and pushing them back down the supply chain.
Sounds simple?
The end-to-end solution involved delivering:
A bespoken online ordering platform.
Management of payments from over 150 garment manufacturers who were ordering direct in multiple currencies.
Building a network of seven regional hubs to service the geographical spread of countries where those factories were based.
Training each factory in the handling and application of the security devices.
Building a reverse logistics network with three regional hubs (UK, USA and Czech Republic).
Creation of a recycling facilities in UK and China.
Dealing with complexities of China customs protocols to allow resale of recycled stocks.
Capable of handling 45 million units a year.
Generating a cost saving of 40% of a recycled item compared to making new.
Removal of 1,600 tonnes of landfill annually.
Rewarded partner retailers with a rebate for every item returned for recycling.
I cannot wait to build the next solution and our “Six Sigma Black Belt” is poised and ready to help work out how to build a sustainable solution that delivers commercially.