About Us
Awards/Recognition
Environmental Working Practice
Recycle-IT! | A Brief History
Formed in 1995 by Michelle Rigby and George Ruddock, Recycle IT! has, since April 2006, been owned and managed by Manchester Aspire Ltd -- a social enterprise providing training, paid work experience and real jobs for homeless and other long term unemployed people.
As the largest UK - wide not-for-profit IT recyclers we provide a professional redundant IT equipment data-wiping and disposal service for major corporates, local authorities and small businesses.
We supply low cost refurbished computers to:
• Voluntary groups
• Charities
• Churches and other places of worship
• Education and schools
• Disabled people and other disadvantaged groups
• Embryonic businesses
Our largest growth market is in exports, where we export exclusively through our partners Computer Aid International, supplying schools and third sector organisations in developing countries with low cost refurbished IT equipment. www.computer-aid.org
Recycle-IT! | About Us
Recycle-IT! is a Social Enterprise that supplies high-quality refurbished computers without the sky-high price tag.
It takes unwanted industry computers and adds new software to suit the individual and then sells them as low cost alternatives to new models. Over 4000 individuals and community groups have benefited.
Today, those without access to computers and the Internet are more and more disadvantaged and disenfranchised from a range of services. Recycle-IT! allows charities and voluntary groups to computerise correspondence or information and increase fundraising ability through increased professionalism, and helps students and schoolchildren make the most of their education. More and more older people are taking advantage of a low-cost entry into the information age and discovering a new world through access to email and the internet.
Recycle-IT! takes customer care very seriously, providing helpful, friendly and jargon-free advice to their customers, and an unparalleled after-sales service helpline which holds the customer’s hand until they are confident with their machine.
Our employment strategy is underpinned by our unequal opportunities policy, which means that we only take on people who have experienced long-term unemployment. They are generally referred to us through a recognised training agency and are supported through work placement into permanent jobs.
What is a Social Enterprise?
A social enterprise is a not-for-profit business that has social as
well as economic aims.
Recycle-IT! | Computer Aid International
From 2006 Recycle-IT has exported exclusively through our partners Compuer Aid International the worlds largest non-profit supplier of computers to developing countries. In the UK over 70,000 PCs have been donated to Computer Aid International in just 6 years, enabling over 5,000 organisations in the developing world to benifit.The majority of these have gone to schools and community organisations in sub-Saharan Africa. They have also shipped thousands to Latin America and the South Asian sub-continent.
Computer Aid International PCs are now being used in thousands of schools benefiting many hundreds of thousands of students. And it's not just schools, their PCs are also being used to enhance the capacity of not-for-profit organisations. Organisations whose work collectively encompasses a huge range of areas central to the development process including health, human rights, HIV/Aids, environment, too name a few.
Computer Aid International aims to increase the number of UK organisations donating their used IT equipment for re-use overseas and identify and work with those organisations in recipient countries able to derive maximum value from refurbished computers it also aims to provide training and work experience in computer repair to people from socially excluded communities in their workshops in the UK.
Recycle IT! loading container to Swaziland for Computer Aid International in November 2006. Click on images to enlarge.
Phone: 0793 951 4661
