Pick Your Side

Our most advanced bin yet

Are you team Barbie or Oppenheimer? Would you rather win the lottery or meet your soulmate? And is it a barm or a muffin?  

Based on the OG Ballot Bin, proven to reduce cigarette litter by 73% (Ellipsis Earth, 2021) by asking life’s biggest questions and getting smokers voting with their butts, the Big Ballot Bin applies the same behaviour change principles and methodology to general waste. When you’ve got an idea that works, there’s no harm in a bit of reuse and recycling. 

#PickYourSide was a collaboration with KFC to test whether introducing Big Ballot Bins to UK highstreets impacts and reduces litter levels in city centre locations.  

The problem

Hubbub polling found 8 in 10 British adults get frustrated by litter.  

Bins in hotspots, fines, educations all play an important part in tackling litter and there’s been great success with these campaigns. 

 And yet, it remains a tough nut to crack – why else are you reading this?  

 More than 20 pieces of litter are dropped per second (2M/day) costing UK taxpayers about £1BN per year (Keep Britain Tidy) and despite best efforts, much of this still ends up in our natural environment where it causes havoc. 

But so can playful nudges encouraging people to talk and think about litter and put their rubbish where it counts to keep our streets clean. 

Our approach

Knowing that more bin-novation was needed, we enlisted the help of Instrument Industries, the manufacturers of the original Ballot Bin, to think about how we can replicated the successful elements of the original ballot bin and supersize for litter.  

And so, the Big Ballot Bin was born. A solar-powered, interactive, customisable and beautifully designed electronic live voting bin.  

We partnered with Manchester City Council and Southampton City Council for 8-weeks over the summer of 2023 to test whether these new Big Ballot Bins could reduce litter on UK highstreets by sparking debates rather than wagging fingers. 

The Big Ballot Bins in action.

The impact

10 million Brits saw #PickYourSide*. Which makes the Big Ballot Bin our most famous bin yet! 

Beyond new-found fame, our latest litter-tackling creation used its binfluence to achieve two core campaign aims, which consisted of getting the nation… 

Tackling litter  

• The Big Ballot Bins had a capture radius that was 2.5x larger than existing bins on average*** 

• Drinks litter was reduced by approximately 70% and food litter by around 60% within 20m of the bins*** 

• 70% of people saw voting bins as a good way of reducing litter** 

Talking rubbish  

• Of those who used a Ballot Bin, 58% had a conversation about them with someone** 

• During the 8-week campaign, there were 618 mentions of #PickYourSide on social media seen by 3.6 million people 

• #PickYourSide was featured on BBC News and mentioned a number of times on BBC Radio 

*According to nationally representative polling of 3,001 UK adults, October 2023 

**According to on-street surveying of 114 members of the public in Manchester and Southampton 

***Ellipsis Earth, October 2023 

Get involved

• Interested in our Big Ballot Bins? Fill in this short form and we'll let you know if they’re up for grabs in the future.

• Got the ballot bin bug? Check out the OG Ballot Bin, available to buy wherever you are

• Take a look at our Plastic Fishing campaign where people can litter pick aboard boats made from 99% recycled plastic