New bins unveiled in Southampton and Manchester encourage the public to vote on topics such as Barbie vs Oppenheimer and Liam Gallagher vs Noel Gallagher in a bid to reduce litter.
The #PickYourSide trials, established and designed as part of a partnership between environmental charity Hubbub and KFC, have set up new Big Ballot Bins in Manchester and Southampton city centres as part of a project to tackle litter.
Described as the “first of their kind”, the companies say the new Big Ballot Bins use solar-powered sensors to detect and count which option the public vote for as they throw away their rubbish, with digital screens keeping track of the score. The questions will be in place for four weeks before being changed to a new set of topics.
We’ll be tracking the impact they have through independent, scientific measurement.
The impact of the bins and campaign will be assessed by local partners and independently measured by environmental tech company Ellipsis Earth which will use artificial intelligence to identify and scientifically measure changes to litter levels around the bins.
The companies say the data will help measure the impact of the bins and assess whether using Big Ballot Bins could help other city centres and locations tackle litter too.
Gavin Ellis, Director and Co-Founder at Hubbub, commented: “Since we created the Ballot Bin voting ashtray back in 2016 and saw it successfully nudging smokers to bin their butts, Hubbub has wanted to test the same approach with litter bins.
“We’re always looking for creative ways to reduce littering and we hope the new Big Ballot Bins, which are built based on proven behaviour change principles, will do just that. We’ll be tracking the impact they have through independent, scientific measurement.”