CIWM

The journal for waste & resource management professionals

Meet The Industry’s 50

Fastest Growing Companies

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The CIWM Journal

100 years February 2010
1910 - 2010
 finance

Waste’s Fast
Following on from their article
on the waste industry’s top 20
companies, Mark Wilson and
Robert Pearce of Catalyst
Corporate Finance turn their
attention to the 50 fastest growing
companies in the waste industry,
as introduced by Ben Wood

T
he phrase “in the current
economic climate” has become
a staple of our vocabulary in
the last 12 months, but I make
no apologies for using it again here
when I say that when I was offered
the opportunity to run an article on
the fastest 50 growing businesses in
the waste industry, my response was:
“Some positive stories on business
growth? In the current economic
climate? Yes please!”
Our colleagues at Catalyst Corporate
Finance, the company behind our
successful “Top 20” series of articles
carried out the research and have
provided us with an impressive list of
50 waste-based businesses that are
beating the recession to return some
very impressive figures… as the table
opposite shows. However, in the
tradition of all good chart countdowns,
you’ll have to turn the page to uncover
those from 10 to two, with our winner
profiled on page 22.
What I can tell you now, without
giving the game away, was that the
company that tops the list really was a
run-away winner. A compound annual
growth rate of more than 170 percent
saw it more than double that of even the
second-placed business.
Of course, posting any positive
growth rate should be considered a
major success, and those businesses
such as Glasdon, Ramshorn and Biffa,
placed at 48, 49 and 50 in the list,
have themselves delivered a fantastic
performance, which brings us nicely
onto a breakdown of the primary sectors
of the Waste Fast 50.
Waste management businesses
accounted for 34 percent of the top
50, with some of the industry’s most
recognised names – the aforementioned
Biffa, along with Grundon, Cory, Hills
Waste Solutions and Bywaters – making
further strides forward, but it is some
newer names that have burst into the
top 10.
Equipment suppliers and manufacturers
accounted for eight of the top 50, while
organics, plastics, aggregates, electricals,
paper, glass, clinical waste, landfill and
mobile phones were all represented,
showing that recyclers across the board
were capable of achieving growth.
Catalyst also noted that more than
20 percent of the companies listed
were backed by a private equity firm,
including our number one and two
placed businesses. Outside of the top
10, these also included Enviroco, AWS
Eco Plastics, OSS Environmental, MRS
Environmental, PHS All Clear, Agrivert,
Cory Environmental and Biffa.
Catalyst also looked at the size of the
businesses listed, noting that the majority
have annual sales of less than £50m (84
percent), with just eight of the top 50
achieving sales of more than £50m.
The majority of businesses listed have
also been in existence for a number of
years – typically more than a decade.
Despite that statistic, the top two
businesses are both relatively young –
our second placed business starting
operation in only 2006! Organic
growth has also been a prominent
feature of the top 50 but, once again,
our second placed business proves the
exception to the rule having completed
three bolt-on acquisitions.
“The waste industry’s Fast 50 makes
fascinating reading because there is
so much movement in candidates that
qualify as private groups,” said Mark
Wilson. “We expect other new entrants
in next year’s review as larger players
dispose of their non-core subsidiaries
and they enter private or financial
ownership.”
Verdant and Shore Recycling would
have both been included in the 50, had
they not been acquired, according to
Catalyst’s criteria (fully explained on
page 22), while Wilson added: “The
full effects of commodity price volatility
and reduced commercial and industrial
waste levels have not yet been reflected
in the reported figures, so we can
expect the 2011 Waste Fast 50 to look a
little different.”
Congratulations to our top 10, and
especially to our outstanding winner,
and we hope you find the data makes
interesting reading… and here’s to
further industry growth in 2011. CIWM

18 CIWM February 2010

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Company Primary Business LFY CAGR Turnover Website

11 Enviroco Limited Hazardous / Oils 2008 38 28,197 cutwastecosts.com

12 AWS ECO Plastics Limited Plastic 2008 32 10,193 jayplas.co.uk

13 Futur Limited Equipment 2008 29 16,308 futurwaste.co.uk

14 Stirling Fibre Limited Paper 2008 28 20,856 stirlingfibre.co.uk

15 G.B.N. Services Limited Skips 2008 27 7,902 gbnservices.co.uk

16 OSS Environmental Holdings Ltd Hazardous / Oils 2008 25 24,964 ossgroupltd.com

17 Ascot Environmental Limited 1 Equipment 2008 25 65,731 planetgroup.co.uk

18 T J Transport Limited Aggregates 2008 25 14,393 tj-waste.co.uk

19 ECO Sustainable Solutions Limited Organic 2008 24 5,634 thisiseco.co.uk

20 Centrol Recycling Group Limited Regional WM 2008 23 19,537 centrolgroup.co.uk

21 Avondale Environmental Limited Landfill 2008 23 22,963 avondalelandfill.co.uk

22 Roydon Holdings Limited Plastic 2008 19 17,875 roydon.com

23 Environmental Waste Controls Ltd Regional WM 2008 19 23,526 ewc.eu.com

24 Blue Machinery (Spares) Limited Equipment 2009 18 6,083 bluemachinerycentral.com

25 WasteCare 2 Electrical 2008 17 18,449 wastecare.co.uk

26 Harpers Environmental Limited Organic 2009 16 8,448 eharper.co.uk

27 MRS Environmental Services Limited Regional WM 2008 16 25,808

28 Grundon Waste Management Ltd Regional WM 2008 16 82,321 grundon.com

29 Cleansing Service Group Limited Regional WM 2008 15 44,367 csgwasteman.co.uk

30 O’Donovan (Waste Disposal) Limited Skips 2008 15 11,928 odonovan.co.uk

31 PHS All Clear Limited Regional WM 2009 14 52,936 phs.co.uk

32 Silent Valley Waste Services Limited Regional WM 2009 13 6,841

33 H. Sivyer Transport Limited Aggregates 2008 13 12,166 hsivyer.com

34 Cumbria Waste Management Ltd Regional WM 2009 12 13,488 cumbriawaste.co.uk

35 Agrivert Limited Organic 2008 12 7,940 agrivert.co.uk

36 Cliniserve Limited Clinical 2009 12 12,081 cliniserve.co.uk

37 Hills Waste Solutions Limited Regional WM 2008 11 53,916 hills-group.co.uk

38 Reuse Collections Limited Glass 2008 11 30,129 berryman-uk.co.uk

39 Premier Waste (UK) Holdings PLC Regional WM 2008 11 5,226 premierwasteuk.com

40 ACM Waste Management PLC Equipment 2009 10 9,986 acmplc.com

41 Devon Waste Management Limited Regional WM 2009 9 16,652 devonwaste.co.uk

42 Bywaters (Leyton) Limited Regional WM 2009 8 25,567 bywaters.co.uk

43 Taurus Waste Recycling (Holdings) Ltd Skips 2008 8 12,040 taurus-waste.com

44 Whale Tankers Limited Equipment 2008 8 24,650 whale.co.uk

45 Castle Environmental Limited Hazardous / Oils 2008 8 11,392 castle-environmental.co.uk

46 Chambers Waste Management PLC Regional WM 2008 8 11,137 chambers-group.co.uk

47 Cory Environmental Holdings Ltd National WM 2008 7 201,518 coryenvironmental.co.uk

48 Biffa Limited National WM 2008 4 776,500 biffa.co.uk

49 Ramshorn Limited Equipment 2008 4 17,640 skipunits.co.uk

50 Glasdon Group Limited Equipment 2008 3 32,274 glasdon.com

Table 1: the Waste Fast 50 companies as ranked from 50 to 11

1 Ascot Environmental Limited is the primary trading entity within UK Capital Venture (Holdings) Limited
2 WasteCare is the trading name of Silver Lining (Holdings) Limited

LFY refers to the latest financial year for which data was available
CAGR refers to the company’s compound annual growth rate
Turnover is measured in thousands GBP for the last available year

February 2010 ciwm 19

 finance
Riverdale Paper PLC
Primary Business: Paper
LFY: 2008
CAGR: 39%
Turnover: 7 281
Web: www.riverdalepaper.plc.uk
The Riverdale Paper Group started life as Riverdale
Recycling, offering services for the recovery and recycling
of all types of paper and board. The organisation has
grown through the addition of other business services
and now consists of three separate, specialist divisions of
security shredding, paper recycling and waste recovery.
Riverdale Security Shredding now provides a
comprehensive data destruction service, encompassing
the secure disposal of all types of digital media and
equipment, whilst the Group’s recycling services have
broadened to include all types of waste recovery and
disposal with the establishment of Riverdale Waste.
Celtic Recycling Limited
Primary Business: Electrical
LFY: 2008
CAGR: 39%
Turnover: 7 838
Web: www.celtic-recycling.co.uk
Celtic Recycling describes itself as a specialist in the
recovery and recycling of end of life heavy electrical
equipment, as well as hazardous waste treatment and
disposal, and it has used the skills developed in response
to the electricity industry demands to grow its business
in other sectors with plant or equipment disposal needs,
such as rail network operators and major power users.
Based in Bridgend since 1993, the company has made
notable strides, with 2010 seeing it set to look at making
innovative use of bar code technology to track movements
of hazardous and non-hazardous waste consignments for
enhanced auditing and monitoring purposes.
Choice Waste Management Limited
Primary Business: Exporter
LFY: 2008
CAGR: 39%
Turnover: 16 329
Web: www.choicewastemanagement.com
Choice Waste Management recycles plastic, paper
and cardboard waste. The company was established
by Rizwan Iqbal in 1997 after identifying opportunities
throughout the world in waste recycling, and started by
exporting plastic packaging waste.
From its small origins the company has since grown
into an organisation that is now an accredited exporter
of packaging waste (being able to issue PERNs), a
registered waste carrier and also registered as an
exporter of waste materials to China with the General
Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection &
Quarantine of the P.R. of China (AQSIQ).
20 CIWM February 2010
GSS Support Services Limited
Primary Business: Regional WM
LFY: 2009
CAGR: 50%
Turnover: 7 442
Web: www.gdd-supportservices.co.uk
GSS, as its name suggests, is a multi-service support
organisation, providing a range of specialist services in
areas that are non-core activities for its clients, including
waste management, recycling and cleaning services,
hence its inclusion in the Waste Fast 50.
With access to UK, European and worldwide recycling
markets, GSS’ waste management services include
fully managing its clients’ waste streams and generating
revenues, while it has also developed an expertise in
managing WEEE, but its primary goal remains waste
minimization. It strives, where possible, to return recycled
materials to its clients to make a truly closed loop system.
Enpure Holdings Limited
Primary Business: Equipment
LFY: 2009
CAGR: 51%
Turnover: 81 417
Web: www.enpure.co.uk
Enpure is a process engineering business offering services
from design through to construction for the environmental
and industrial sectors. Operating in the UK and overseas,
the company turned its attention to the solid waste market
early in 2000 and is one of three businesses in the top 10
to be backed by a private equity firm – Spirit & Maven.
It is a design-led business supported by effective project
delivery. It offers services from concept and feasibility
studies, through design and build, to operational support
services. Enpure offers both its own key technologies
and those of others, including autoclaving, aerobic and
anaerobic MBT, materials recover and fuel preparation.
J&A Young (Holdings) Limited
Primary Business: Plastic
LFY: 2008
CAGR: 56%
Turnover: 43 525
Web: www.jayplas.co.uk
Established in 1975, J&A Young leads the
plastics specialists in the Waste Fast 50 – a strong
category with three companies in the top 25.
Its five sites, covering Birmingham, Loughborough,
Derby and Manchester employ the latest technologies
and the company currently collects and recycles
post-consumer waste from several major retailers, which
is used in the production of refuse sacks and builders
film, to name just a couple of the recycled products on
offer. Its sorting plant in Derby is the only plastic sorting
facility in the UK capable of separating all polymers
within a plastic bottle grade, by both type and colour.

HW Martin Waste Limited
Primary Business: Regional WM
LFY: 2009
CAGR: 62%
Turnover: 26 704
Web: www.hwmartin.com
The Martin Group of companies has delivered
public and private works contracts for over 30 years.
The Group’s key areas of activity are waste recycling
and management; traffic management systems;
commercial fencing and vegetation management;
permanent and temporary road safety barriers; and
plant and vehicle provision and maintenance.
The waste recycling and management division,
HW Martin Waste Ltd, collects, separates, bales and
provides re-processors with glass, plastics, paper, card,
metals, concrete & rubble, wood and garden waste.
Recycled materials go back into the manufacturing
process to make new products including bottles,
paper and aggregates. The green waste is composted
and used in agriculture, horticulture and domestic
gardens. The companies waste management services
also include operating household waste recycling
centre’s, Materials Recycling Facilities and managing
transfer stations and collection contracts.
HW Martin has a rolling programme of research into
new outlets for recyclable materials. The company
diverts over 300 000 tonnes of recyclable material
each year and it says “none of it goes to landfill”.
Community Waste Ltd
Primary Business: Regional WM
LFY: 2009
CAGR: 68%
Turnover: 14 519
Web: www.communitywaste.org
At a time when many businesses are diversifying in
order to grow, it is refreshing to read almost immediately
on Community Waste’s website that it considers itself a
“recycling company” not a “waste management business”.
Among the services it offers, however, is not only the
handling of recyclable waste, but the design, construction
and operation of materials recovery facilities (MRFs), the
marketing of recyclable materials and a full audit trail.
Working with paper, glass, plastics and metals,
Community Waste currently handles 200 000 tonnes of
recyclables per annum and it has its own environmental
objective to achieve 100 percent diversion from landfill by
finding new markets for all other materials that are part of
its own dedicated Materials Expansion Research Program.
The company has four MRFs, in West Oxfordshire,
Doncaster, Sheffield and Milton Keynes (MK), with the
93 000 tonne per annum MK site standing as an example of
Community Waste’s expertise in design, construction and
operation. In December 2009 it signed a 15-year, £150m
contract to continue sorting dry recyclables on behalf of
Milton Keynes Council – the sort of development that
has helped propel the company into the top three fastest
growing waste businesses in the UK.
finance
Reconomy (Holdings) Limited
Primary Business: Regional WM
LFY: 2008
CAGR: 84%
Turnover: 74 527
Web: www.reconomy.com
Of all the companies in the Fast 50 Reconomy was
one of only a few to be formed less than 10 years
ago and is one of only 20 percent of businesses to be
PE backed. It was also recognised for adopting the
“buy and build” strategy whereby a company initially
invests in a business platform and then acquires smaller
business to bolt on.
Reconomy Holdings Ltd was formed in July 2006
to develop a business in the UK recycling and
waste management sector. To date, is has made 12
acquisitions and the business has annualised turnover of
approximately £80m.
The largest part of the group is currently Reconomy
Solutions, the leading national outsourced waste
services provider, which operates nationwide recycling
focused waste management and compliance services.
In addition, Reconomy has to date acquired a total of
seven businesses, operating in the East Midlands and
East Anglia regions, providing a broad range of recycling
and waste management services to customers in the
commercial and industrial sector. These businesses
have been re-branded as Reconomy Oakley, Reconomy
Alibone and Anglia Recycling. These brands are being
developed through further investment in sorting and
processing facilities in order to minimise the amount of
waste going to landfill.
Reconomy completed the acquisition of Nutrafeed, a
company specialising in recycling packaged food wastes,
based in Wrexham.
Mark Wilson, Catalyst Corporate Finance, said:
“Reconomy is a well known example of a private
equity backed waste business pursuing a rapid
buy-and-build strategy. I know that it is well known
to many regional operators and there is a lot of
interest throughout the industry as to how successful
its growth model will ultimately turn out to be.”
February 2010 ciwm 21
 finance

Eazyfone Limited
Primary Business: Mobile Phones
LFY: 2009
CAGR: 172%
Turnover: 36 246
Web: www.eazyfone.com

Described by the authors of this research as “by far

the fastest growing waste recycling business”, Eazyfone
registered a compound annual growth rate of 172
percent, more than double that of even the second
placed Reconomy – a truly outstanding performance and
made all the more impressive by the fact that the mobile
phone recycling sector was not the best represented in
the top 50. In fact, its only representative in the top 50
was Eazyfone!
Eazyfone is also one of the youngest companies in the
top 50, being formed in the last decade (in 2001), but
growing rapidly over the last three years in particular.
Unlike many of the companies listed here, whose
customers are local authorities and corporate clients,
Eazyfone’s customer base is purely private consumers,
and Catalyst expects to see even further growth from the
Reproduced with kind permission of CIWM and IWM Business Services

business as it exports its business model to Europe and

expands its service to other, associated products, such
as MP3 players, digital cameras, laptops and satellite
navigation systems in the near future. But what exactly
does it do?
Eazyfone Limited is comprised of five brands: FoneAid,
Envirostudents, Fones4Schools, Envirocharities and its most
prominent brand, Envirofone.com. Envirofone is a mobile
phone recycling operation that collects and refurbished old
handsets and either remarkets or recycles them, and is the
most recognised and high profile of the Eazyfone stable/
The Envirofone brand was added to the Eazyfone range
in 2005 and remains committed to supporting a greener
environment… and this is how.
The company strives to re-use every phone it receives
and grades them all accordingly, paying the sender an
appropriate fee depending on the model and its quality.
Those that can be used or easily refurbished go into
stock for re-sale, while those that cannot be re-used are
reprocessed, valuable components recovered and the
remainder smelted for energy recovery.
The handsets are recovered from individuals and charity
organisations, and Envirofone has paid out more than £30m
to its customers to date. As part of its commitment to the
environment it has provided funds to help save endangered
rainforests, and under the Envirocharirities brand you
will find such organisations as Barnados, Age Concern,
Caudwell Children’s Recycles and Rainforest Concern.
Managing director, Nick Brown (pictured atop a pile
of mobile phone handsets), has been with the business
since June 2008 and he told CIWM: “Eazyfone – trading
as Envirofone – has enjoyed an exceptional year’s growth.
The hard work and dedication of our team has really paid
off, and our strategic business plan is reaping impressive
dividends. We’re thrilled to be listed in CIWM’s Waste Fast
50 and look forward to continued success in 2010.”

Waste Fast 50 Methodology

The Catalyst Corporate Finance Waste Fast 50 2010 ranks the fastest growing private waste services businesses in the UK by sales.
Criteria for inclusion: the Waste Fast 50 assesses waste services businesses which are registered in the UK as private, independent and
unquoted companies. This category includes private companies that are backed by private equity houses.
All companies considered for inclusion in the Waste Fast 50 achieved a level of annual sales of £5m or above in at least one of the three
financial years assessed.

Exclusions: companies which have filed abbreviated accounts at Companies House without disclosing sales levels are excluded. Unaudited
management accounts are not accepted due to the absence of any third party validation. Companies that have any shares or other financial
instruments listed on a stock exchange, or where any of their shares are held by any UK or overseas quoted company, do not qualify for
inclusion. Metal recyclers have been deliberately excluded as this represents a very distinct niche within the recycling industry.

Data-collection methods: companies have been identified through several research methods including the analysis of information from
Companies House, financial databases, press coverage and other research.

Any firm which believes that it may not automatically be included in the 2011 Fast 50 due to the unavailability of public statutory accounts
information but which believes it has a verifiable case for inclusion, is invited to contact Robert Pearce of Catalyst Corporate Finance at
robertpearce@catalystcf.co.uk

22 CIWM February 2010