Placer’s One Big Bin program wins national award

Published on August 29, 2017

The One Big Bin program makes recycling easy in Placer County by sorting waste for our residents. To familiarize residents with the idea of tossing their mixed waste and recyclables into one bin, the Western Placer Waste Management Authority and its Regional Recycle Group developed the One Big Bin’s innovative “You toss. We sort.” campaign.

The campaign to raise recycling awareness has won the Solid Waste Association of North America’s Gold Excellence Award in the Awareness Campaign category.

One Big Bin made recycling so easy that proper disposal was no longer top-of-mind. Frequent questions from residents concerned about mixing recyclables with their trash along with questions about when the county would begin a recycling program suggested that many were not aware of One Big Bin’s purpose.

The jurisdictional partners of the Placer County Regional Recycle Group hired a marketing consultant to conduct research and implement a multi-faceted and integrated educational effort. An innovative outreach strategy emerged from customer research. A fresh, new brand was born, and an integrated marketing plan was launched to creatively point the community to the One Big Bin website and improve awareness of proper disposal techniques.

The One Big Bin campaign was featured on billboards, in cinemas, YouTube, digital ads, bill inserts and newsletters, which resulted in the campaign exceeding its goal of a 400 percent increase of visitors to the website in its first month of the launch. Elements of the One Big Bin campaign were seen nearly 4 million times.

“The One Big Bin outreach delivered a concise and consistent message across Placer County - that we are deeply committed to recycling here, and that it couldn’t be easier for our residents to do their part,” said Paul Joiner, Lincoln city councilman and current chair of the authority’s board of directors. “The amount of web traffic we received to OneBigBin.com significantly exceeded our anticipated goals, a clear sign that residents truly care about doing their part for our community and environment."

The award recognizes outstanding waste programs and will be presented at WASTECON, SWANA’s annual conference, in September.

View more information on the program.