CASE STUDY: Amey
Amey has partnered with the social enterprise Paint360, a family-run social enterprise business based near Birmingham. Both partners have benefited, and Amey’s expertise and experience has been used to help Paint360 grow and develop.
Paint360 provides environmentally-friendly recycled paint, whilst creating jobs for young people who are ex-offenders or long-term unemployed in the Black Country, home to higher than average levels of economic deprivation.
As part of Amey’s ambitious social enterprise spend targets, it has recognised a need to support social enterprises either to establish, diversify or grow. At the same time, it has recognised a potential barrier in small-to-medium size social enterprises growing into national organisations. In progressing its partnership with Paint360, Amey identified an ideal opportunity to develop a relationship for mutual benefit.
Paint360 receives waste paint from household waste recycling centres at a transfer station based in the West Midlands. It is then recycled, re-engineered and sold in the UK. Every litre of paint bought from Paint360 saves 1.3kg’s of embedded carbon from affecting the environment. In addition, in the last seven years, Paint360 has created jobs for 34 young people who are ex-offenders or long-term unemployed in the Black Country.
In 2019, Amey purchased around 10,000 litres of recycled paint from Paint360, for use on its prisons, MoD and Schools contracts across the UK – saving 13.16 tonnes of CO2
A partnership agreement with Paint360 was drafted, setting out what both were seeking to achieve. For Amey this was about increasing spend with Paint360, with the aim of them being the preferred paint supplier across Amey’s operations. For Paint 360, it was about sustainable growth, with access to advice and guidance regarding planning and permitting, communications, marketing and innovation. In setting out objectives, regular meetings were established and governance put in place to check in on progress – supported by a dedicated Amey project manager.
Amey is also providing source paint to Paint360 through the management of its Household Waste Recycle Centres such as on the Isle of Wight.
Paint360 plans for growth include the consolidation of their Midlands sites, bringing the existing transfer site and production facilities under one roof. To support this, the Amey Consulting team supported Paint360 in their Permit & End of Life Application, required for submission to the Environment Agency.
As part of the partnership, Paint360 will also be supporting Amey to provide future work experience opportunities to prisoners released on ROTOL who have taken part in the CRED programme – with a view to these becoming full time upon release.