February 2025 – Wakefield/UK – Kelling Group is pleased to announce its partnership with Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, a leading environmental charity dedicated to protecting and restoring wildlife and wild places across Yorkshire. This collaboration marks a significant step in Kelling Group’s ongoing commitment to sustainability and corporate social responsibility.
Through the partnership, Kelling Group will provide financial support, as well as engage in hands-on conservation efforts alongside the Trust to promote wildlife protection, habitat restoration and biodiversity across the region. The partnership aims to strengthen the Trust’s ongoing projects, which include safeguarding vital habitats, reintroducing endangered species and tackling the effects of climate change on local ecosystems.
“We are thrilled to be supporting the incredible work of Yorkshire Wildlife Trust,” said Matthew Jowett, CFO at Kelling Group. “As a company, we believe it is our responsibility to give back to the environment that we work in and support efforts that protect our natural world. For years, we have been helping our customers reduce their carbon footprint by providing the most efficient equipment for their needs. By partnering with the Trust, we hope to make a meaningful contribution to wildlife conservation and inspire others in the industry to take similar action.”
Yorkshire Wildlife Trust has been at the forefront of local conservation efforts for nearly 80 years, with a mission to create a wilder Yorkshire. The charity works tirelessly to protect wildlife and restore landscape scale habitats, raise awareness of environmental issues, and engage communities in nature conservation.
Photo: Barn owl by Doug Swinson
Rachael Bice, CEO of Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, added, “This is fantastic support from the Kelling Group who join us as valued corporate members. We are grateful for their commitment which will help us continue our vital work protecting and restoring wildlife and wild places right across the region. With their involvement, we can expand our reach and have an even greater positive impact on the region’s biodiversity. We also look forward to welcoming them to one of our beautiful nature reserves soon.”
Kelling Group will also be taking steps to incorporate sustainable practices within its operations, further reducing its environmental footprint. The company plans to encourage employees to get involved in volunteering opportunities with the Trust and will host awareness campaigns to promote environmental stewardship within the community.
This collaboration is just the beginning of Kelling Group’s ongoing efforts to drive sustainability and foster positive change within both the business and environmental sectors.
For more information about Kelling Group’s partnership with Yorkshire Wildlife Trust or to learn more about the Trust’s initiatives, please visit www.ywt.org.uk/.
Photo: Seagrass by Georgia Bennett
About Kelling Group
Kelling Group is a leading rental and leasing provider of modern, specialist vehicles and equipment for the infrastructure and construction sectors. With a strong commitment to sustainability, Kelling Group reduces environmental impact through innovation, smart practices and partnerships that promote a greener future. www.kellinggroup.com
About Yorkshire Wildlife Trust
Yorkshire Wildlife Trust is a leading conservation charity, part of The Wildlife Trusts UK-wide movement dedicated to protecting and restoring the wildlife and natural habitats of Yorkshire. With a vision to create a thriving natural environment for wildlife and people, the Trust works across the region to protect endangered species, restore vital habitats, and inspire future generations to take action for nature.
At Welfare Hire, our “Don’t compromise” ethos resonates with the government’s challenge of balancing infrastructure development with promoting nature. Our belief is that progress and sustainability can, and should, coexist without compromise. This ethos reflects the idea that while it’s essential to streamline planning processes and expedite critical infrastructure projects, it’s equally vital to ensure that environmental concerns are not side lined in the pursuit of growth.
To achieve both efficient development and nature recovery, Welfare Hire offers a range of smart eco assets and services designed to uphold the highest standards on project delivery without cutting corners on our sustainability responsibilities.
Take a look at our unique, patented smart ECOWC2 as one example of how our solutions can integrate into the current landscape of reform and help infrastructure clients and contractors deliver on ESG and commercial goals.
1. REDUCE Your CARBON HANDPRINT
On-site facilities require regular servicing with transport to and from the site. This might not seem like much, but these are the sort of easy-to-solve carbon emitting and water wastage practices which accumulate – and end up making a dent in your ESG score.
The average chemical toilet used on construction sites requires at least one weekly service, and doesn’t use recycled water. But this isn’t construction leaders’ only option.
The unique XL Smart Water system built into our ECOWC2 towable toilet block and other welfare units boasts more than 6x more capacity. They typically take several months to fill, reducing the frequency of servicing trips and volume of site externalities – and therefore the carbon emissions your site is responsible for.
Not only that: they also harvest rainwater to create a more sustainable system. Your site is not only responsible for less water usage but you can also report on the smart initiatives taken to make these incremental savings.
2. Improved Employee Experience
Imagine it’s your first day on a construction site: you go to wash your hands, and discover there’s no hot water. It’s a small factor, but over the course of a full work day – and a complete project – this starts to have a real impact on the general mood and morale on-site.
Better facilities that run smoothly and provide plenty of room can therefore have a dramatic impact on employee experience. It signals to staff that they are valued, helping with general wellbeing, increased retention and loyalty. Improved hygiene also reduces the spread of disease and helps keep your staff safe. 68% of workers say that poor hygiene at work has made them sick and unable to do their job¹ – meaning improved hygiene leads to fewer sick days, higher morale and a more productive workforce.
3. Cost Savings
The cumulative costs of poor hygiene are staggering. One study found that employee sickness related to poor hygiene costs UK business more than £1.5 billion each year alone². As a result, improved on-site hygiene facilities are not just a question of ethics or responsibility to your employees – they are a near-guaranteed boost to your bottom line.
Between fewer sick days from employees, less money spent on services and higher retention of staff, the cost savings attributable to improved on-site hygiene facilities start to add up. But how much could your specific site save?
More than 2 million people in the UK suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) – a form of depression caused by the darker months¹. As a result, construction sites often see a slump in morale as the days get shorter.
However, this dip in morale is not inevitable if you have the right tower lights. Here are three ways they can keep employee morale up during the darker months:
1. Keep sites safe
Employee morale often suffers due to a perceived increase to physical risk. With reduced visibility and wetter conditions, including ice and snow creating new trip hazards, workers are liable to feel their site becomes less safe during the darker months. And given that construction-related fatalities have been known to increase by as much as 55% in recent reporting², safety will be a particular concern this Autumn and Winter.
Tower lights help mitigate these risks and keep workers safe. The increased visibility site lighting unlocks helps assure that trip hazards are seen, collisions are avoided and workers feel confident that they are safe at all times.
2. Improve productivity
Darker, harsher autumn and winter days can make it difficult to get much done on a construction site. In fact, some estimates suggest that extreme cold can reduce productivity by 50%³. Lower productivity can lead to missed targets or delays to the projects – both of which take their toll on employee stress and morale.
That’s why ECO LED site lighting is an essential tool for employee safety, morale and mental health. By enabling work to continue safely when the sun has gone down, projects are able to prevent potential productivity losses. As a result, workers don’t feel the strain of stressed project management or tighter deadlines that would otherwise come with a productivity drop.
3. Create flexibility onsite
The single best way to boost employee morale is by providing flexibility. And with daylight hours reducing, the window to deliver work outside in natural light becomes limited.
The solution is enabling work to be delivered safely and practically during darker hours, providing illumination from lighting towers for flexibility in working hours and schedules. Portable lighting towers enable extended work hours and, subsequently, give teams the time to fit in their work schedules.
We believe this is a key factor in employee mental health through the year, but it may be felt most during the darker months. And as a result, this autumn and winter are the perfect time for contractors that don’t currently use LED tower lights to enable employee flexibility to start.
Never Settle For Second Best
At Welfare Hire, we believe innovative technology should serve every aspect of a construction project. That’s why we are dedicated to providing not only eco-friendly tower lights, but helping our partners use them to unlock a range of added value – including boosting employee morale.
Organised in conjunction with the Yorkshire Children’s Charity, the awards and fundraising event took place in Leeds with over 100 regional businesses partaking. The calibre of finalists was very high with good representation of businesses from different industries across the region.
Kelling Group were delighted to accept the award of Mid-Market Corporate of The Year at this year’s The Yorkshires. Business Awards and would like to congratulate the other nominees and winners, as well as the event attendees, in supporting the incredible event for Yorkshire Children’s Charity.
Aside from celebrating the best of what the Yorkshire region has to offer in business, the event supported the Yorkshire Children’s Charity to raise awareness and funding. In excess of £182,000 was raised on the day, which will go a very long way to supporting the region’s most vulnerable children throughout the winter.
“On behalf of the entire Kelling team, I am honoured to accept the award of Mid-Market Corporate of the Year. There was also a fantastic amount of money raised on Friday – very well done to all the hard working team at the Yorkshire Children’s Charity.”
The UK’s leading hirer of mobile eco welfare units and vehicle mounted access platforms, to infrastructure sectors, Kelling Group is setting the standard for modern, environmentally-conscious specialist equipment hire. The business prides itself on providing clients with the most modern, innovative, eco-friendly specialist assets in the market. Last year, the group invested c. £20m in fleet with a similar investment anticipated in the next 12 months.
A true innovator in its field, Kelling Group is a specialist equipment hire business built on five key pillars: Quality, Service, Environment, Wellbeing and Value. Backed by dedicated ‘Kelling Guarantees’ for each principle, the Group vows to hire out only market-leading vehicles and equipment, at the most competitive rates, and with premium levels of nationwide customer support. Kelling’s specialist units are designed to maximise smart and effective working, with the Group also offering some of the cleanest and greenest products on the market – many of which include the UK’s first Lithium hybrid power, solar panels and fuel saving systems – with CO₂ reduction rates more than 15 times the industry standard.
Kelling is a strategic investor in core infrastructure sectors, such as rail, highways, power, telecoms, utilities and civil’s projects. The Group has two specialist equipment divisions: Access Hire Nationwide, which specialises in vehicle mounted access platforms, and Welfare Hire Nationwide, focusing on mobile eco welfare units, welfare vans and lighting. As a Group, Kelling and its subsidiaries have invested in some of the sector’s most advanced vehicles and equipment.
“We have the largest and most modern fleet in the UK in our chosen specialist areas of focus,” says Stephen Moore, Group CEO. “Our strategy is to partner with our clients, providing the best a and service for critical infrastructure projects in the UK.”
The Group also aims to become the industry’s most eco-conscious operator coinciding with growing calls for businesses to hit new carbon emission targets, as well as increase their focus on sustainability. As a result, more and more major authorities and organisations, including HS2, Network Rail, and Highways England, see Kelling as a key partner in helping them achieve their environmental and CSR goals.
Andy Grayshon, Commercial Director Welfare Hire, states: “The average age of our assets is two and a half years, and the maximum age is five years. Along with a unique design, our mobile Eco welfare range uses the latest in hybrid power technology and smart water systems, and we tow all our units with our own fleet of low cost, low carbon, modern delivery pick-ups.”
“Our products can make an immediate positive environmental impact,” Grayshon says. “One example of this is the use of Smart XL Water ceramic toilets and services. Traditional welfare units have chemical toilets that are required to be serviced weekly. On top of that, their tank sizes are relatively small – typically around 50 to 80 litres – so you will often be at full capacity very quickly. Our Smart XL Water system, on the other hand, is used as part of a water flushing process like you have at home or in an office, with the tank being up to four times bigger, more hygienic, and longer lasting. This helps to decrease the need for disposal services, and therefore, reduces transport journeys being made to and from the site by around 60 per cent. If you think about that, by using our eco products, you are eliminating hundreds of thousands of tonnes of CO₂ annually.
“A second differentiator is our use of smart hybrid power,” Grayshon adds. “We were actually the first in the market to introduce Lithium hybrid power for our units, allowing customers to run off battery power for longer and, consequently, further decreasing reliance on a generator. It means our products can reduce a contractor’s carbon footprint, fuel usage, costs, and even noise pollution. Typically, with our smart hybrid power management, you can achieve up to 94 per cent running time on battery and even guarantee silent running overnight. Fuel usage and costs for many clients drop to as little as one pence per day.
“Finally, while many competitors are using HGVs to deliver their units, we are using our own fleet of modern, Euro VI compliant, low-emission pick-ups, driven by our own experts. This provides efficiencies in terms of site access, flexibility in delivery, and faster set-up times. Our units can now be set up in just six seconds, which is much quicker than anyone else in the market, as well as creating a much smaller carbon footprint. The upshot is that in 2021, all our collections, deliveries and relocations will be quick, easy, low cost and low emission.”
Though many companies quote the environmental benefits of their products, not one of Kelling’s competitors can lay claim to Welfare Hire’s Smart XL Water or Lithium hybrid power systems. Always looking for ways to improve, the Group recently added telemetry to its capabilities, allowing for smarter, more effective remote management of its assets. The result is an unrivalled package of innovative products with a premium service that continues to attract the UK’s biggest and most successful infrastructure firms.
“Some of our latest work has come with utilities contractors as part of the AMP7 national framework,” Grayshon states. “We are also working with Network Rail, as well as a variety of SME and Tier One contractors on CP6, a key rail framework.”
“Kelling is also keen to invest in people, developing skills and expanding its workforce. Over the last 12-18 months, we have continued to recruit, expanding the team so that Kelling can offer more dedicated service, sales and customer support. As we move forward into 2021 and beyond, we’ll continue to invest in the business and core infrastructure areas,” states Moore.
Before each one of its welfare units is delivered to a client, it undergoes a 62-point inspection regime encompassing all manner of mechanical, electrical and functional pre-hire checks to ensure that the product is of a quality beyond the industry norm.
“Going above and beyond in our service is a vital part of maintaining high quality assets, and the work that goes into that requires investment and efficient processes,” Grayshon asserts. “We do everything we can to make sure that our units show up on time, that they work in the way they are supposed to work, and that our clients can rely on the quality of the kit. That’s why we also plough substantial investment into the updating of our fleet, and ensuring that it meets the needs of our clients.”
Of course, though Welfare Hire and its products prove increasingly popular, the business is not Kelling’s sole focus; the Group’s other subsidiary, Access Hire, is an equally thriving operation. Another market-leader in its specialism, Access Hire has a fleet approaching 1,000 vehicle mounted access platforms for safe working at heights of up to 16.5 metres. As well as efficiently serving Kelling’s main infrastructure sectors in telecoms and power, Access Hire also provides solutions for CCTV installation, facilities management and tree surgery – all supported by customer service available 24/7, 365 days a year.
Access Hire was ranked number one for vehicle mounted access platforms in the UK in November 2020 by Cranes & Access magazine. Martin Whitehead, Sales Director Access Hire, states: “Access Hire is the market leader in VMAP hire in the UK. We continually invest and have the largest and most modern fleet in the market, working with our clients to ensure not only the best, most modern assets, but also first class service, which is vital when providing specialist equipment to critical infrastructure markets.”
As part of its brand promise, Kelling pledges to provide quality products and services, unmatched value, and optimal wellbeing onsite – all whilst minimising the environmental impact on our planet. Commitment to this promise has been a key part of the Group’s success over the years, and the importance of the mission remains unchanged in 2021 as Kelling and its subsidiaries move into the future with ambitions for more growth.
“Kelling Group has grown organically, and in some respects under the radar as we’ve quietly gone about our business,” Moore comments. “More people are now becoming aware of us and that’s great because we have some genuinely unique propositions. We can add a lot of value around innovation, sustainability, quality and wellbeing. In the next three to five years, we will become even more established in the market, working in partnership with key clients in our core infrastructure sectors. With our help, we know that our partners across the UK will be able to deliver smarter and more modern approaches to their projects to help future proof their business.”
We’re excited to invite existing and new partners to visit us at this year’s Rail Live outdoor exhibition.
This is a great chance to see the very latest in next generation mobile ECO welfare units and lighting towers. We are launching our next generation range for partners to see first-hand the unique design and features. Our mobile ECO welfare hire and tower lights, are designed for the Rail sector.
Innovations and investment into next generation technology and design include:
The UK’s 1st ECO Hybrid Lithium power system
Smart ECO water WC systems with XL capacity
Telemetry to help better optimise greener and smarter working
Unique designs and configurations for welfare cabin space and dynamic projects
Our dedicated Rail team look forward to welcoming partners new and old within the Rail industry. Come and see how we can help future-proof delivering greener and productive projects together!
For further info in advance, please feel free to contact us at info@welfarehire.com.
Access Hire (“AHN”) has moved further ahead of the competition to cement its number 1 ranking in the UK, with the largest and most modern fleet of VMAPs.
Over the last 12 months, AHN has maintained its consistent annual investment in fleet to ensure it continues to provide its customers with the most modern, high quality and reliable assets, along with the best full maintenance and 24/7/365 breakdown service on the market. AHN has pushed forward with over 100 new vehicles added to the fleet in the past year, with a similar investment already planned for 2021.
Company
2020 Van Mounted MEWPs
2020 Ranking
2019 Van Mounted MEWPs
2019 Ranking
Change in Units
Access Hire (Kelling Group)
668
1
563
1
105
Nationwide Platforms
271
2
294
2
-23
Height for Hire
200
3
241
3
-41
SHB
126
4
126
4
0
AFI – Uplift
71
5
72
5
-1
Smart Platforms
21
6
21
6
0
Source: Cranes and Access Magazine
Martin Whitehead, National Accounts Director, said “We are focussed on providing our clients with the most modern assets, along with a premium level of service. Anyone interested in VMAP requirements, either for short-term or longer-term lease needs, should get in touch so we can begin the planning process and discuss the various options available”.
