These days we focus on holiday home waste, though its not where it all began – The Chenoweth family has been living on the Roseland for over 100 years and is involved in our local community to this day. Originally our family were blacksmiths from St Buryan. In the early 1900’s Joseph Henry Chenoweth began an agricultural contracting business (as a pioneer of the day he invested in a threshing machine amongst others!). He was known locally as ‘Ol Joe’, and as well as being a man of huge stature, as a devout Methodist, he was also well known for his integrity and ethics.

The business was then expanded to include a coal yard and contractors by Joe’s son Agar Chenoweth, who lived on site with wife Gladys. They had a large family to feed so most of the children were employed within the business, keeping it family-focused, shovelling coal and delivering the 50kg bags to customers around the Roseland. They were a hardy, well know family in the area; easily recognisable as their skin was often covered in oil and coal (except on Sunday bath day!).

Whilst he was known to be a very hard man, especially to those closest to him, Agar did however, loan two of his sons, Brian and Eric, money to buy the business from him and develop it further to include a petrol station and mechanics workshop, whilst their older brother Michael, set up his own coal delivery business from his yard in Grampound.

Along with their wives Val and Mary, Brian and Eric continued to grow the petrol station and car repairs business and expanded it to include a new haulage element ‘Chenoweths Haulage’, running tippers and mixers.

In the late 1980’s the brothers amicably split company. Eric pursued a career elsewhere whilst Brian and his wife Val continued to run the business. They added a new dimension to the business – Aggregates & Minerals Ltd. Brian also created a Waste Transfer Station and was proud that three generations of Chenoweths were operating from it.

During the economic crash of the early 1990’s Brian expanded the company further to include a construction company, Rhos Construction, which continues to operate from the Ruan site.

In 2000, Brian sold Aggregates & Minerals Ltd and left the site at Ruan and moved to St Mawes. He went on to become a Justice of the Peace and later a commodore of the sailing club in St Mawes – where he can still be found today!

Julian Chenoweth, Brian’s son, did not follow in the footsteps of the family tradition, instead, at age 17 he joined the Royal Marines Commando’s. He successfully gained his green beret in 1996 but after serving just a few years, he left due to severe injury. He took up a position working for the Scientific Exploration Society leading expeditions in South America for 6 years and finally returned to Cornwall. In 2005 he started a new company, Maen Karne Aggregates, from the site at Ruan High Lanes.

With just one 7.5-ton Iveco truck, Julian started his new company from scratch, almost entirely operating the site on his own except for assistance from his oldest school friend Guy Tomlinson. Guy was qualified as a forest manager and worked with Julian, sorting waste in the transfer station and driving the truck. Later Julian recruited his sister Cathy to look after the accounts.

During the 2008 recession, Julian expanded his business to include a ready mix concrete company and Maen Karne Concrete Products Ltd was born. Over the following years he continued to successfully expand his fleet of trucks further, so that by 2016 the company operated over 100 trucks and had also added a concrete block manufacturing business to its group. In a short space of time Maen Karne had become one of the largest, independent suppliers in the South West, providing bagging, haulage, waste management, concrete products and much more.

In 2017 Maen Karne was sold to GRS Roadstone who have continued the business’s success.

Following the sale of Maen Karne, Julian went back to his family roots at Ruan and formed a new company, Chenoweths Trading Company. Guy joined Julian at Chenoweths. The business is now a multi-faceted company serving the private and commercial construction industries, providing both goods and services, the main focus being holiday home waste management services. And, as our name suggests (Chenoweth means ‘new house’), we support the continuation of new homes being built in Cornwall – true to name, true to nature!