Rebranding: How To Sustainably Recycle Old Workwear

Branded workwear brings many benefits to businesses and organisations, from promoting a brand image in commerce to enabling workers in sectors such as security and healthcare to be correctly identified.

As corporate identities are refreshed, fashions evolve and a wider diversity of ethnic and cultural requirements are accommodated, workwear often requires rebranding, but this creates an ethical problem – what to do with the obsolete clothing.

While workwear is generally taken out of service once damaged or signs of wear compromise its appearance or function, rebranding often results in potentially large amounts of clothing being scrapped that is still more than fit for purpose. How can we dispose of old workwear in an environmentally responsible manner?

Why You Shouldn’t Donate Branded Workwear To Charities

While donating obsolete workwear to a charity might seem a benevolent gesture, there are reasons why businesses and organisations should avoid doing this.

For a start, charities only want clothing that can be easily resold to the public. Garments that display a company name or logo may deter shoppers from buying them, resulting in large quantities of dead stock that the charity must then dispose of. Be wary also of charities who export donated clothing to other countries; in many of these countries, the sheer volume of surplus donated clothing is creating an environmental crisis of its own.

Security is another consideration. If branded workwear identifies the wearer as an authorised representative of a business or organisation, could it be used to carry out criminal activity or to fraudulently gain entry to a restricted area? Bear in mind that a previous design of branded workwear may still appear valid after a rebranding exercise and could potentially be used illegally, putting your organisation, your customers or the general public at risk.

Why Workwear Recycling Is A Sustainable Option

Workwear is frequently made from highly durable manmade fibres which can be readily recycled. After shredding the fabric, it can be

broken down into filaments that can be respun and rewoven to make new fabric. Even fibres that aren’t suitable for respinning can be repurposed as padding in products such as acoustic screens, upholstery and vehicle linings.

This recycling process considerably extends the useful life of the filaments used to make branded workwear and reduces the volume of waste clothing being sent to landfill either in the UK or abroad each year.

As UK manufacturers can source these recycled fibres locally rather than from overseas, they also reduce the carbon footprint of their supply chain.

Sustainable Workwear Recycling Made Easy

Sustainable solutions must be easy and cost-effective to implement if they are to be genuinely successful. That’s why Avena Group has created SECUREBRAND®, a secure and environmentally responsible service for collecting, shredding and repurposing redundant workwear and uniforms.

On-site bins that allow your workforce to securely dispose of workwear are regularly emptied by Avena customer service representatives, ensuring you always have a safe and tidy working environment. We can also carry out bulk collections of redundant workwear accumulated during rebranding to keep your storage space or warehouse free of clutter.

The discarded workwear is then transported securely to our shredding plant and destroyed, preventing it from falling into the wrong hands.

We also provide certification for you to maintain a full audit trail of all discarded workwear and to ensure its disposal satisfies environmental and security requirements.

Avena – The Single Source For Sustainable Recycling

SECUREBRAND® is just one of the services that Avena operates, with our well-established SECURALL® document destruction and SECURETECH® IT and media destruction services offering secure, confidential and sustainable recycling options for hard copy and electronic data storage. Combine all three services, and you have a reliable, professional one-stop provider for all your secure and sustainable recycling needs.

For further information on our full range of secure destruction services, register your interest below or speak to an expert.

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