Hiring equipment produces less waste than buying it for a single use. The same chairs, tables and catering equipment serve hundreds of events over years rather than being purchased, used once and discarded. That difference compounds at scale — Expo Hire handles more than 150 orders a week.

Why hire from Expo Hire

• The only hire company in the UK that delivers and collects on Sundays. Morning and afternoon windows available every day of the year, including Bank Holidays.
• Live GPS tracking on every delivery and collection. A tracking link and SMS ETA are sent on delivery morning. No other UK hire company offers this for both directions.
• Every order 100% guaranteed before you pay. Stock and logistics are confirmed at the point of booking. No substitutions or shortfalls on the day.
• No security deposit on any order. No damage deposit, no money held back — ever.
• Free Minor Damage Waiver on every order. Accidental breakages during normal event use are covered at no extra charge.
• Choose morning or afternoon for delivery and collection independently. Your schedule, your venue, your window.
• 11 regional depots across England and Wales. Orders route automatically from the nearest depot to your venue.

Equipment lifecycle

All equipment is built for longevity and repaired rather than replaced where possible. The EventPro® furniture range is designed for this: steel chair frames are serviceable, finishes can be refinished, and the construction tolerances are specified for a decade of commercial use rather than a few years of domestic life. A set of folding chairs that might last 3 to 5 years in retail use runs for 10 or more years under our maintenance schedule.

Depot network

Orders are dispatched from whichever of our 11 depots is closest to your venue. That keeps road miles lower than a single centralised warehouse serving the whole country. Our depot locations — Bristol & Avon, Birmingham, London, Chiltern, Cotswold, East Midlands, North West, Solent, South Wales, Thames Valley and Yorkshire — are chosen to minimise the distance each van travels per order.

Tableware and packaging

Crockery, glassware and cutlery are washed and returned to stock after every hire. We don't use disposables. The send it back dirty service means customers return items unwashed and we handle commercial cleaning — more efficient than customers washing items individually before return.

Transit uses reusable crates and box systems across the range. Cardboard packaging is kept to a minimum.

Policy documents

Our environmental policy sets out specific commitments and practices across the depot network and delivery fleet. Our modern slavery statement covers supply chain standards.

Carbon footprint per event

Take a wedding with 100 guest chairs. If you buy 100 new steel or aluminium chairs, manufacturing emissions can sit at about 15kg CO2e per chair. That puts the manufacturing footprint at about 1,500kg CO2e before the chairs even reach the venue.

Hire works from stock already in circulation. A local van delivery for that same wedding can sit at about 50kg CO2e for the trip, depending on route length and vehicle load. That means the event avoids about 1,450kg CO2e of fresh manufacturing emissions. On that single job, hiring cuts the manufacturing carbon by about 97 per cent.

The saving grows when the same chairs move on to the next event instead of sitting in private storage for eleven months. Reuse drives the result, not a slogan.

End of life

Hire stock does not last for ever, but the exit route matters. When a chair or table reaches the end of its working life, Expo Hire strips the item down by material. Steel frames go into metal recycling. Fabric, pads and plastic elements are separated before processing.

The depot team does not send clearance stock to landfill. Parts with life left in them stay back for repairs. Frames that fail inspection go into the metal stream. That process keeps scrap sorted and keeps useful stock in service for longer.

Customer actions that help

You can cut waste on the return leg. If you use the send-it-back-dirty option, stack the items in the original crates and keep the racks complete. That protects breakable stock and speeds up the unload at the depot.

Flexible collection windows help as well. If the venue can offer a wider pickup window, the transport team can combine nearby jobs into one van route. Fewer separate runs mean fewer miles and less idle time for vehicles.

Clean returns still matter for furniture. Fold chairs back into the transport stacks, keep table trolleys with the same table size and pass back any transit covers. Small habits on site protect stock for the next client.

Sustainability questions

Why does hiring cut carbon for a single event?

Hiring spreads the manufacturing footprint across many uses. A batch of chairs already in service can cover another event with one transport run, while buying new stock creates a fresh manufacturing footprint for that one date.

What happens when hire equipment reaches end of life?

Expo Hire strips out reusable parts, recycles steel frames and sends separated fabric components into the right waste stream. Depot clearances do not go to landfill.

How can I reduce the impact of my order?

Return the equipment in the original crates, keep groups of the same item together and allow a flexible collection window where the venue can do so. Those steps cut handling time and can reduce van movements.