With a larger fleet and strategic acquisitions, CSH expands cross-county to deliver waste management services
From its humble beginnings as Colchester Mini Skips in 1981, CSH Environmental (CSH) has expanded and branched out to become the multi-service waste management company it is today, covering a far wider area and offering an array of comprehensive packages that go above and beyond skip hire. Following strategic rebranding over the past 45 years, recent investments and land acquisitions, Director Daniel Cox joins Transportation & Logistics International to tell us more about the company’s extensive growth: “Originally, the company was founded by long-distance lorry driver, Terry Slade,” begins Daniel. “He used to drive back and forth between the UK and Sweden, where he’d work abroad for a couple of weeks, return home and have a week off. It was during his weeks off that he began delivering skips – he purchased a skip lorry along with ten skips and that’s how the business started. Eventually, Terry stopped long-distance lorry driving and, in 1988, he acquired the land we still operate from today, renaming the company Colchester Skip Hire. We later rebranded again in 2013 to CSH Environmental.”
Today, CSH delivers a complete portfolio of waste services, specializing in trade waste, and collecting food, glass, and dry mixed recycling separately in all bin sizes while still providing skips and tankers as part of its service. The tanker service is run through its sister company, AA Turner Tankers, which falls under the CSH Group. Daniel highlights CSH is now much more than just a skip hire business and explains how this motivated the second rebrand: “The motivation behind this was due to a couple of reasons; the business evolved from purely a skip company to a waste and recycling company, so one of the main reasons was the change in company direction. Instead of just being a skip company, there was a refocus on sustainability and recycling, which in turn grew the other services and subsequently, Colchester Skip Hire didn’t fit for trade waste. Location was the second key factor. It became apparent that people primarily use local companies – for instance, a Norwich resident wouldn’t usually call a company in Colchester for waste disposal, but they’d be far more likely to call CSH Environmental, which also means the rebrand helped us expand our area. We now cover waste disposal for the whole of East Anglia using our own wheels, and across the entire country through a brokerage.”
The company has made significant investments in its fleet, enabling it to expand geographically and promote brand visibility; CSH lorries are a vivid shade of blue, which ‘stands out a mile,’ Daniel describes. “The fleet is integral to our advertising strategy,” he continues. “And from an operational point of view, the newer vehicles reduce cost, meaning less downtime, greater parts availability and a decrease in fuel consumption. The amount saved on fuel is substantial, and in turn, we don’t have to pass further costs on to the customer, enabling us to provide a more reliable, efficient and cost-effective service.”
Alongside developing the fleet, CSH acquired extra land at the end of 2025 and has also invested in new storage facilities. Formerly a council depot in the 1950s and 1960s, the additional land has since been regenerated and the company has made it a secure site, changing it into an open yard for container storage. “Apart from creating more space to store all our empty skips and bins, the new land has enabled us to redevelop the main site, meaning our whole site is permitted for waste processing,” discloses Daniel. “It has allowed us to improve movements and operational flow around the site and generally carry out work to a higher standard. The new storage facility is for storing processed waste once we’ve split the material into several products. This space is integral to reducing operational costs and tipping time, making us more of a tipping hub rather than just a waste company, which will also enable us to work with other local recycling companies.”
On the topic of recycling, Daniel reveals sustainability is a difficult thing to manage in the waste industry, yet CSH always takes the ‘Five R’ approach to strive for environmental responsibility. “We either recycle, reuse, reduce, repurpose or refuse,” he elaborates. “For us, it’s not a case of just sending waste out for incineration or landfill. The only material that goes to landfill is hazardous waste like asbestos. We work with local companies and charities to support the recyclability of complex products. Plus, we launched a recycling campaign that involves accepting waste from farmers for free, before donating the profits back to charity for their training and development funds. In addition, we had the material they brought in made into different items, from park benches to drinking cups. It’s all about circular economy and being mindful.”
After going from strength to strength following its cross-county expansion, CSH is on a trajectory of continued success with two driving factors for growth in 2026. “Our first priority this year is rolling out digital waste tracking in the first half of the year. This will be integral for the business allowing our waste returns to be generated within a 48-hour period, delivering far greater visibility to the Environment Agency, the customer, and us as a company,” says Daniel.
“The other focus for CSH is investing in AI for waste sorting. We have already invested in mechanical technology, but AI is really becoming mainstream and is still developing at a dramatic rate. Our initial building here is ready for redesign, a big part of which is utilizing AI to help us do the job more efficiently. We’re a progressive company that always strives to set high standards and I feel very lucky to be a director here,” he concludes. “The company has a history of incredibly hard-working employees doing an excellent job to make a success of the business and, over the next five years, we’ll be looking at further acquisitions with a view to cover more of the area in an efficient way, attaining new depots and becoming an industry leader in our region.”