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When considering where to establish a business that would lead the world in its ability to remanufacture toner cartridges using advanced and automated toner production lines, Wrexham, North Wales, would likely not be on the radar. It’s not especially accessible, but the scenery is as lovely as the highly skilled workforce at the home of Brother Industries Ltd.—I was thrilled and privileged to receive a factory tour and briefing on an unusually bright and sunny Wednesday in May!
Experience Matters
Walk onto any UK factory site and you will immediately be “managed” from the front gate by the tough health and safety requirements that govern UK workplaces, and there is no exception here. You do not achieve the array of awards and accolades this Scope 1 and 2 Carbon Neutral site can claim without strictly adhering to the rules.
Its 180 employees and two colleagues from Japan work some of the most unusual hours I’ve come across: a nine-day fortnight (two weeks). Why? No specific reason. It’s just the way it’s always been, which means they can earn every other Friday off (not a bad deal if you ask me). It’s an ethic that starts to explain why over 20% of the workforce have over 30 years of service with the company, while five employees have been on the site since it was established to produce typewriters in 1985. Other products produced here in the past include microwave ovens, personal faxes, and keyboards, but since 2004 it has been Brother’s center for recycling toner cartridges.
Technology and Sustainability
The Wrexham facility is a specialist, zero-waste-to-landfill site for the remanufacturing of toner cartridges. Brother boasts a strong commitment to the circular economy and it can claim over 40 million cartridges remanufactured to date—that’s a reuse level of almost 80%, which is impressive. This achievement was recognized by the German ecolabel Blue Angel when its TN-3512 RE toner cartridge became to first receive the challenging DE UZ 177 (2021) standard for at least 75% of reused components by weight.
Remanufacturing of supplies is at the heart of Brother’s business model. Every toner cartridge produced by Brother can be uniquely identified by its history, with the number of times a cartridge has been remanufactured and the components reused stored in the company’s databases. These provide unique insight into the performance characteristics of every component, which further improves quality and reduces waste.
Cutting Edge Automation
Visiting toner remanufacturing sites can sometimes be a rather low-tech experience, but that is not the case here. The production line exudes technology: From the versatile cobots supporting the pace of the workforce to the advanced robotics unscrewing fasteners or removing developer rollers, this is hands-off production at its finest—that explains how Brother achieves a consistent, high-quality remanufactured cartridge each and every time.
We were not expecting to turn a corner and be presented with the Molding Department. Fully automated robotics drive 25- to 550-ton injection molding machines that produce component parts for a broad range of brands outside the Brother family. Sustainability runs through the operation because, the company has worked with UK Universities to develop technology to convert post-consumer waste into raw material for molding into selected Brother components.
| An operator at an injection molding machine in Brother’s toner cartridge remanufacturing in Wrexham, North Wales. |
The Future Has to Be Sustainable
This is a facility that has a history of reinvention. Long gone are the typewriters and fax machines. The management and workforce are lean and agile, ready to pivot to the next generation of products demanded by the market (or its sister company in Slovakia that also remanufacturers cartridges from across Europe). We witnessed technicians deep into the manufacturing of new supply production lines for deployment at other sites around the group.
The folks at the Wrexham site embrace remanufacturing across marking technology, even if it means breaking old market recycling habits to clean up and reuse waste efficiently. Meanwhile, they are also reinventing cartridge manufacturing to facilitate refilling automation. Hardware will not be ignored in Brother’s quest to exceed the planet’s circular demands.
Keypoint Intelligence Opinion
It’s not often that a manufacturer opens the doors of its factories for closer inspection, so we were honoured when Brother invited us to step inside. Once there, it’s difficult to not believe that it is possible to close the loop, reuse imaging supplies multiple times, and do so profitably without compromising quality for the benefit of the planet. That is something the entire supplies market needs to aspire to, and it’s clear that Brother is a leader.
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