GLASDON UK LIMITED
PRESTON NEW ROAD
BLACKPOOL
LANCASHIRE FY4 4UL
Tel: enquiries@glasdon-uk.co.uk
Fax:
Suppliers of: Waste bins, litter bins, cigarette bins, recycling bins, bollards, road safety, seating, temporary & permanent buildings, shelters, water safety, grit/salt spreaders
Customer care and new product innovation have established Glasdon U.K. as a market leader in the design and manufacture of award-winning litter/recycling bins, road safety products, a diverse range of building systems, shelters, seating products, noticeboards water safety products and snow-clearing equipment.
Glasdon U.K. Limited serves over 50,000 customers throughout the UK and Ireland including national and local government departments, public utilities, retailers and leisure companies plus a broad spectrum of British industry and commerce.
Main Product Ranges:
Litter Bins
Glasdon supply indoor and outdoor litter bins and dog waste bins in a wide range of styles, colours and materials. Constructed from tough and durable materials to withstand harsh weather conditions, vandalism and the stress of everyday use.
Recycling Bins
Attractive and modern recycling bins for indoor or outdoor use. A large selection of recycling bins featuring clear graphics which make recycling easy. Whatever size of recycling bin you are looking for, you’re sure to find a solution within the range.
Shelters
A wide range of heritage and modern shelters such as cycle shelters, pram shelters and waiting shelters. Glasdon also offer a selection of smoking shelters and canopies for designated smoking areas.
Road Safety Products
Road safety products from Glasdon are proven to be highly effective and reduce maintenance time and costs for users. The range includes traffic calming bollards, street lighting bollards and hazard and verge markers.
Buildings and Housings
Modular temporary, semi-permanent or permanent buildings and equipment housings to suit all requirements.
Seats and Benches
The seating collection from Glasdon can add comfort and style to any seating area. A range of hard wearing seats and benches are made from environmental friendly materials that makes them strong and durable requiring minimal maintenance.
Winter Safety Products
The range of winter safety products from Glasdon include grit/salt bins, grit/salt spreaders and snow shovels designed to meet all your grit/salt storage and spreading requirements.
Smoking Control Solutions
Free-standing and wall mounted cigarette bins and smoking shelters have been designed by Glasdon to alleviate the problem of unsightly cigarette butts.
Water Safety Products
Water safety Products include lifebuoy housing and water rescue devices made in the UK by Glasdon. Our Guardian lifebuoy housings are highly visible and readily recognised in an emergency.
Further technical information, image galleries and product specifications are available through the Glasdon UK website or via the BPi Download Library.
Glasdon UK Socket Systems - The Complete Guide To Better Bollard Fixing
Installing bollards doesn’t always have to be a costly, difficult, and hazardous undertaking. Instead, using a socket system provides a much quicker and easier solution to fix and remove your posts.
Socket systems allow bollards to be easily inserted and withdrawn from the ground, providing an extra level of flexibility and efficiency for your highway management. Need to remove a bollard temporarily? Detach it in mere seconds! Need to replace a damaged post? Insert another just as quickly, without any of the fuss!
Download the Glasdon Guide to Bollard Socket Systems via our website.
Glasdon offers a range of options for socket systems, from our sturdy Standard Socket System to our cutting-edge Lockfast™ model, each with their own unique features.
In our latest eBook, we run through the advantages and assets of socket systems, and why they provide a better fixing option for your bollards than more traditional fixing options.
In this eBook, we discuss:
- How Socket Systems work, and what makes them unique?
- Key features of Socket Systems, and how can they be utilised?
- Which Socket Systems will best serve your needs?
The full eBook is available to download below for free.
Glasdon UK - Disposable Vapes: A Crisis In Waste Management
Disposable vapes have proven themselves detrimental for both the environment and health & safety. To address this issue, the government is introducing new legislation to ban the sale of single-use units, but how well will the new regulations work, and could the damage already have been done?
Disposable Vape Bin
Single-use vapes will be banned from 1 June 2025 onwards – that was the recent announcement made by representatives from the UK government. Despite the sudden crackdown, similar legislation had been in the works for some time already, with the previous parliament considering action as early as January this year. The UK’s constituent countries are also onboard, with Wales announcing it will follow suit, while Scotland has already passed a similar resolution, which will now be delayed slightly to come into effect alongside England’s ban.
Whichever way you see it, the new changes will certainly have a major impact on the UK’s vape industry, our society, and the wider environment, in some ways helpful and in some ways hindering. Individuals and organisations across the breadth of the UK will have to adjust to the new rules, gear up for the phasing out of disposable vapes, and forge a new, greener path.
In our latest article, we’ll explore how the debate surrounding disposables has developed, what exactly the new legislation entails, and what that might mean for the future of recycling and single-use vapes.
The Problem With Disposable Vapes
The environmental concern surrounding disposable vapes is exactly what the name implies – they’re unsuitably disposed of, whether that’s being tossed in a general waste bin or littered on city streets or in our local parks.
According to research completed by Material Focus, the number of disposable vapes thrown away has skyrocketed from 1.3 million to 5 million every week. That’s equivalent to 8 every second, a shocking figure to be sure. Equally worrying is the sales volume of single-use vapes, which show no signs of slowing down, with numbers doubling from 2022 to a whopping 7.7 million units every week. With these discarded devices flooding our public spaces, it’s little wonder why the government has taken such drastic legislative action.
The main driving force behind this reaction is that most disposable vapes contain a lithium-ion battery. While generally safe, these batteries can cause serious harm if damaged, crushed, or overheated. Potential hazards range from electrical fires (over 700 fires every year are caused by discarded batteries), to explosions (rare but potentially fatal), to released toxic chemicals (corrosive and flammable). As a result, discarded single-use vapes pose a serious health risk to waste management workers and the recycling plants they’re responsible for.
The environmental impact is also devastating. Not only do littered vapes lead to pollution, but their lithium-ion batteries contain toxic substances (like battery acid and mercury) which can leak out and kill the local wildlife and ecosystem. Then there’s the issue of wasted resources, with both lithium and copper being valuable materials that can assist us in the fight against climate change. Instead, as much as 40 tonnes of lithium are dumped as part of disposable vapes every single year.
Compounding the problem is that the recycling process for these units is typically difficult and obstructive. Recycling a disposable vape often requires disassembly by hand, which becomes a time-consuming and rather unsafe venture. Should the current trends continue, our recycling facilities would struggle to keep up and become overloaded by the ever-expanding use of disposables.
Clearly then, the consumption of disposable vapes is a wasteful and potentially dangerous practice, but with more and more people in the UK relying on them, how can this backwards slide be stopped? That issue is what the government’s latest legislation sets out to address.
The Legislation
The legislation, which is supported by both major parties in parliament, has been brought forward by DEFRA and is separate to the Tobacco and Vapes Bill, which is also being considered. The ban is expected to come into effect from 1 June 2025, and strictly prohibits the sale of disposable single-use vapes from that date onwards. The ban will only affect these single-use varieties, and not their rechargeable or refillable counterparts.
According to Circular Economy Minister Mary Creagh, the change is part of a wider push to bring an end to the UK’s throwaway culture, and ensure a more sustainable and green economy. Given the myriad of environmental problems that disposables can cause, the ban (at least in theory) will help reduce litter and pollution across the country. As we’ll discuss soon, however, there is reason to believe that the problem will continue to fester.
A key aim of this legislative push is to prevent 11-15 year olds from turning to vaping, as disposables are often cheaper and more appealing products to younger demographics. The study of vaping is still in its infancy, but some early research suggests that while vaping is still less harmful than smoking, it’s not entirely risk-free and could result in its own side effects. Therefore, any effort to limit access now could help avoid long-term health conditions developing in the future.
Despite this, there are some concerns surrounding the effectiveness of a supposed ‘blanket ban’ for disposable vapes. For one, the black market for illicit vaping is already thriving, with National Trading Standards admitting they seized over 2 million units from 2022 to 2023. A further restriction on the availability of disposables could exacerbate demand, and cause the black market to balloon even further
Then there’s the fact that disposables can serve as a ‘starter’ vape, helping long-time smokers off-ramp from carcinogenic cigarettes and make the switch to ‘healthier’ vaping. The banning of single-use products will therefore raise the barrier to entry in this regard, which could potentially backfire in terms of public health.
Regardless, as the new legislation comes into effect, and more disposables than ever start to get dumped in our public spaces, it’s crucial that any remaining units are disposed of correctly.
What Does This All Mean For Businesses?
The chances are that vape manufacturers will report lower sales than before, which is to be expected. However, the changes may actually benefit them in the long run, as more people turn to refillable products, which will undoubtedly become cheaper and more accessible. A key worry is that these products will simply replace the disposable ones, without consumer behaviour changing at all. Instead of single-use vapes being dumped, it may very well be refillable vapes that are dumped - resulting in an even worse waste management crisis than before.
For local communities and businesses, especially those in the public space/facilities management sector, the above could result in an uptick in vapes being dumped on premises and grounds. It could even potentially continue beyond the initial ban, as despite the purchase of new disposables being prohibited, possessing old ones remains perfectly legal. Additionally, if the black market does begin to develop, or if refillable vapes are dumped at the same rate as disposable ones, the flow of littered vapes may never truly halt.
In any case, managers of public spaces must prepare for the worst, and ensure their facilities are fully equipped for the deluge of disposables that could be heading their way. If not, they risk leaving their premises at the mercy of poisonous and flammable disposables.
Disposable Vape Bin
Acquiring a vape recycling bin might serve as the ideal solution. Placed in high-risk locations such as entranceways or smoking areas, these specialised containers are designed to get your disposable recycling scheme off the ground. Investing in these furnishings will encourage nearby vapers to dispose of their units in a safe and correct manner, helping avoid the many pitfalls that littered vapes can present.
How Can Glasdon Help?
As a long-time provider of quality litter and recycling bins, Glasdon offers exceptional products to protect your property and grounds from poisonous vapes.
Our selection of vape recycling bins are industry-leading, featuring utility-driven design choices to ensure maximum functionality. All of our vape containers are fully see-through and clearly marked, ensuring cross contamination and misuse are kept to the absolute minimum. At the same time, our vape bins are made of strong in-house materials to resist fire damage, and feature a secure lock to prevent outside tampering.
Whether you opt for our interior nexus recycling bin, our exterior recycling container, or one of our cylindrical C-Thru range, Glasdon’s signature quality will be on display throughout your product’s life span.
For more information about how we can help your space become safer and more sustainable through disposable vape bins, contact our exceptional sales advisors today.
