Highlander was formed in 2002 by Brian Bingham and Stephen Duffy, with a view to offering a reliable and competitive brokering service, initially exporting 3 containers of plastics every week. The company grew dramatically in a short period of time and in 2005, we changed the company name to “Highlander International Recycling” to accurately reflect the multi material trading activities of the company. At this stage in our evolution, Highlander International regularly bought over 100 loads every week of recovered paper from all over Britain and Ireland, supplying many large paper mills all over the Far East, UK and Europe.

We continued to build on the solid foundations laid down by the directors and as of 2010 we had outgrown our original offices in terms of business turnover and staff numbers. In 2011, we relocated to new purpose built offices in East Kilbride, on the former site of the famous recycling company John W Hannay.

Later that year, the Directors decided to rent a warehouse on the same site allowing us to bring in small deliveries of recovered paper from the local area and bulk these up into full 25 ton loads of various grades of recovered paper. This was a subtle but significant change in strategy from being a material broker who never physically handled the material, to being a local processor of recovered paper and a direct supplier of material to the approved mill partners we had supplied for years, with third party recovered paper products. As time elapsed, we started to take more and more warehouse space on the site so we could accommodate the increased volume of material we were receiving from the locale.

Our Promise

Highlander promise to collect, shared and recycled your recovered or confidential waste paper in a compliant, secure and professional manner. We aim to offer a reliable and flexible service which you can trust at all times. our friendly staff will know you personally by your name and NOT by your account number so we remain at The Peak of Paper Recycling!

In December 2013, we signed a large, long-term contract with a major paper manufacturer in Scotland which would provide the depot with a guaranteed intake of 10,000 tons per annum of high grade recovered paper. In order to provide the processing and handling capacity that would be required of the contract, Highlander acquired various assets which allowed us to provide a first class service to all of our customers. Highlander took ownership of our Linwood Avenue site on 14th April 2014 with view to turning it into an outstanding, modern recycling facility capable of processing up to 1000 tons of recovered paper per week.

We also purchased and installed modern, safe and efficient recycling machinery to allow us to process all the materials we were receiving at that time and to allow us to grow in a responsible and sustainable manner. We now have a Lindemann Bigro 120 fully automatic baling press and an Imabe 100H fully automatic baling press, giving us the largest baling capacity of any independent recycling company in Scotland. Coupled with a 2.7 meter wide BOA reel splitter, Hammermill shredder, 6 JCB Tele-trucks, 2 JCB material grabs and various other plant and machinery, this represents one of the most modern, safe and cost effective recycling capacities in the land!

In 2016 Highlander launched its confidential waste destruction service to the market, employing 3 full-time staff with a dedicated office for handling all aspects of our shredding customer’s requirements and to help grow this division of our business. The unprecedented success of this service launch and significant increase in volumes, resulted in an investment of £150,000 to relocate the shredding area to a dedicated, fully secure area with a brand new Ulster 45 shredder, re-furbished PALL baler and elevated mezzanine viewing area complete with CCTV camera systems and fob controlled security access systems.