Food Waste Collection in Manchester

Since 31 March 2025, England’s Simpler Recycling rules have obliged workplaces with 10 or more full-time-equivalent employees to have food waste collected separately. Pubs with a kitchen, hotels, takeaways, canteens, food shops, cafés and restaurants are all caught. Food must not be tipped in with general waste or washed down the drain.

Micro-firms with fewer than 10 FTE employees have until 31 March 2027, but starting early frees up room in the general bin.

Your general bins will often weigh less and smell less as well.

Because food waste weighs a lot and has to be emptied often, the bins used for it are smaller than most commercial containers. A few habits help:

• Match collection frequency to your volumes, particularly in warm weather
• Keep cutlery, packaging and anything else that isn’t food out of the bin
• Shut the lid every time, so smells stay in and pests stay out
• Collect scraps in kitchen caddies and tip them into the main bin often

Compostable liners are accepted in some areas – ask before you use them.

Plenty of Manchester kitchens open onto a narrow back alley or a small yard shared with neighbours. A compact food bin is simpler to tuck away and wheel out than a big container, and we can recommend how many bins you need and how often they should be emptied. Bottles from the bar belong in a separate glass collection.

Where residents share the yard or alley, shutting the lids and having bins emptied often keeps complaints about pests and odours at bay. Collection times are settled with you at set-up, with our routes and local access taken into account.