How One Golf Club Cut Its Waste Bill by Over 38% in Two Weeks

Shooters Hill Golf Club is a busy 18-hole members' club in London, running estimated rounds of 40,000 to 50,000 rounds of golf a year. It also hosts weddings and events, runs a kitchen, and operates a clubhouse bar, all of which generate a significant amount of waste every week. Like most clubs of its kind, waste management wasn't at the top of anyone's agenda. But it was costing them a fortune.

When they came to us, the problems were immediate and fixable. Within two weeks, they were on a better contract, with better bins, better habits, and a waste bill over 38% lower than before. Here's exactly how it happened, and what it means for clubs like yours.

What Simpler Recycling means for sports clubs

Before we get into the specifics, there's a piece of legislation coming from The Department of Environmental, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) you need to know about called Simpler Recycling Regulations. Simpler Recycling came into force on 31 March 2025 for any business in England with 10 or more full-time employees. It legally requires you to separate waste into distinct streams before collection, and non-compliance isn't a grey area. On 1 April 2027, the last phase of the legislation will roll out which will also require all businesses with less than 10 employees to be fully compliant to avoid fines.

Most clubs with a kitchen, events space, or bar will have well over ten staff and will fall firmly in scope. If you haven't acted yet, you're already non-compliant, and your current setup is almost certainly costing you more than it should.

The problems we found at Shooters Hill

When we sat down with the club's management team, the issues became clear quickly. None of them were unusual, in fact, they're the same things we see at sports clubs across the country.

• The club had a busy kitchen and restaurant but was not separating food waste from general waste, meaning every food collection was billed at a rate 50% higher than necessary.

• Glass was being separated, which is good, but placed in mixed recycling, where it doesn't belong for most businesses. 

• Staff had very little awareness of proper waste segregation. A single black sack in the wrong bin can cause an entire lorry load to be reclassified as general waste, the most expensive stream.

The audit: spotting what others miss

After an initial conversation to understand the club's setup, we carried out a full waste audit. This isn't a tick-box exercise, it's about understanding exactly what waste streams a site generates, where the inefficiencies are, and what the legal obligations actually require. For a venue like Shooters Hill, with a kitchen, a bar, event catering, and general office and course operations all running simultaneously, there were several streams being missed entirely.

We also reviewed their existing collection contract to make sure any changes could be made without interrupting service. Clubs are busy environments, the last thing anyone needs is a gap in collections during a busy event weekend.

What changed, and why it worked

The changes themselves were straightforward. What made them work was doing them in the right order, with the right support.

Because we work across the entire London waste market rather than going direct to a single provider, we could compare pricing across every available option. The result was a better deal on every single collection, adding up to over £2,500 a year in savings before any operational improvements were even factored in.

Introducing proper food waste separation was the single biggest operational change. With a kitchen running multiple services and regular events, the volume was significant, and at a 50% premium per collection, it had been quietly inflating costs for years. New bins arrived two days before the old setup was removed, so there was no disruption to the club's operations.

Staff training and clear signage followed. Contamination is one of the most common, and most avoidable, sources of extra cost in a busy venue. Posters, bin labelling, and a brief induction for relevant staff are low-effort changes that compound over time. Get it wrong once and a whole lorry load can be charged at general waste rates. We also continued to ensure that none of their waste was going to landfill in accordance with our zero landfill policy. 

The bigger picture: compliance, reputation, and what's next

The savings here came from two places: a better contract secured by comparing the full market, and operational changes that reduced costly waste misclassification. Both are available to most sports clubs, the combination is what makes the real difference.

Beyond the cost savings, Shooters Hill was fully compliant with Simpler Recycling legislation, ahead of time, and without a scramble. That matters both for the legal protection it provides and for what it signals to members, guests, and event clients who increasingly care about where waste goes.

That's a story worth telling to members, and it opens the door to formal recognition through schemes like the GEO Certification, should the club wish to pursue it.

Is your club leaving money on the table?

If your clubhouse has a kitchen, a bar, or a busy events calendar, and most do, the chances are good that you're paying more than you need to, and that your current setup doesn't fully meet the new legal requirements. A waste audit takes one conversation to set up and typically pays for itself many times over in the first year alone.

• Are you separating food waste from general waste?

• Is your glass being separated from the mixed recycling?

• Do your staff know which bin is which?

• Have you reviewed your waste contract in the last 12 months?

• Are you compliant with Simpler Recycling legislation?

If the answer to any of those is "no" or "not sure," it's worth a conversation with our waste specialist here at Waste & Washroom. It takes one conversation to set up, causes no disruption, and for most clubs it pays for itself quickly. The savings are real, the compliance risk is real, and the fix is usually simpler than you'd think.