Well the Christmas decorations are well and truly boxed up and the New Year’s celebrations now seem to be a distant memory, but before Januarys over here at Haulaway, we wanted to stop and take a minute to look back at 2018. And what a year it was for us…
Shiny and New
There were no January blue’s for us last year with the arrival of a brand new tipper lorry at the start of the year. Our skip fleet also received another addition, a new skip lorry complete with fully operational remote control. The end of the year saw something a little larger, an articulated vehicle enabling us to transport our materials to their outputs ourselves.
In April we had a new picking line installed, complete with air conditioning ready for the heat of summer!
We’re Growing
Well, our Polegate site is! In March we were granted planning permission to expand our site in Polegate and use the unoccupied wasteland to further develop our current distribution facility. We’d like to say a big ‘well done’ to Lisa who spoke brilliantly at the committee meeting!
Projects within the Community
Last year saw Lidl opening its 700th UK store located in Polegate. We are proud to have provided our tipper services for crushed concrete and muck away and our skips ensuring a high rate of recycling was achieved throughout the construction process of the store.
Since July we’ve had the pleasure of providing our grab lorry services to assist in the development of Eastbourne’s brand new shopping centre ‘The Beacon’, with work there still ongoing.
We have also been able to provide our services in assisting with the expansion of Willingdon Community School. Once completed, the school will be able to increase its capacity from 1000 to 1200 pupils.
At the end of the year, we were able to help a cause a little closer to home for us providing a range of skips to Hailsham Cricket Club, helping them to meet their recycling needs in the renovation of their club grounds.
The Best of Business Awards and other Achievements
In May we were very excited to receive our ‘Business of the Year’ award in the category Waste Management and we are happy to announce we have qualified again this year.
Also in May, our weighbridge operator Conor passed his HGV driving test. Whilst this has proved very handy in covering holidays and sickness, this year Conor will join our team of skip drivers full time. Well done Conor!
We further improved our Health and Safety proficiency with Lisa, Georgie and Sam all passing the IOSH course ‘Managing Safely’ with flying colours.
Young Friends
Last year we were pleased to become the 1st sponsors of Hailsham Town Youth FC for the under 7’s team.
Towards the end of the year, we welcomed ‘Eco Forum’ a group of young students from Downlands School into our recycling facility in Hailsham. Steve did a great job of showing them around and educating them in the waste and recycling processes!
‘Paper’s for St Wilfrids’ and other Charity Events
With the plans going ahead at our Polegate site it was decided in September that we were in a position to increase our charity kerbside recycling round, whereby we donate the proceeds of unwanted papers and cardboard that we collect from the residents of Hailsham. Another 1000 red boxes were ordered and we set out on a campaign to get the people of Hailsham on board. We’ve had some fantastic support to help us along including the famous ‘Antony Joshua’ making us a video and signing one of our boxes. Safe to say we won’t be sending that one out! So far we have 500 more boxes out and by the end of December had donated an incredible £14,864.75 in total. A huge ‘well done’ to everyone involved and most importantly the Hailsham residents!
To help St Wilfrids further we donated a brand new car to them which the staff can use for home visits. Plus in June a few of us took part in their obstacle event ‘Kapow’ - which now seems a little underwhelming by comparison!
In autumn we held our annual coffee morning for MacMillan with our office staff showcasing their baking skills and to end the year we all had a good laugh dancing around and singing in our Christmas jumpers for the Hailsham Food Banks ‘A Song for Christmas’ video.
From all at Haulaway we wish you a belated Happy New Year and look forward to what lies ahead in 2019!
