A reputation built upon breaking new ground
BREWSTER Brothers may be a relatively new company – it was only launched in 2017 – but its roots go back to a family farming business that started in the
1950s.
This turned out to be a success, eventually growing to about 2000 acres by the late nineties.
The farm was sold at the turn of the millennium and the proceeds reinvested into property development and investment, with one of the sites being a redundant quarry, Craigpark, on the outskirts of Edinburgh.
This was developed into housing with an associated country park.
“In order to create that, we had to infill the quarry void and make it safe”, Scott Brewster, who joined the business in 2007, recalls.
“To do that, we used construction and demolition waste – it was imported to the site to restore it.
“Through that process, we really got to know the waste stream of soil and rubble and became aware of just how much the locality produced on an annual basis. That really helped to get us through the last recession.”
Over a number of years, the company developed a reputation for being able to handle and process construction waste. It began to learn about recycling on a small scale, using mobile units.
“We wanted to see what we could get back out of the waste and if the market would buy it”, Scott adds.
“We tested the proposition and that gave us the confidence to invest in a purpose-built facility.”
To expand further, the business purchased a local competitor firm, inheriting a fleet of lorries in the process. “That meant we could go and source the
waste material and also deliver the aggregate products we were intending to create.
“We also took over a site which was important for developing the recycling facility that we have today.
“We regard what we are doing now as resource management – we don't really like to see things as waste, but as materials that need to be transformed and made marketable again.”
Brewster Brothers has been a real success since 2017, trebling the number of people it employs to 39 and enjoying a significant increase in turnover.
“Our waste generally comes from demolitions. Rubble such as bricks, concrete and asphalt arrives from brownfield sites and roadworks, though the majority of it is soil which comes as excavation waste. However, we also get topsoil and subsoil from greenfield sites as well.”