Recycle for Greater Manchester Campaign Feedback

Recycle for Greater Manchester (R4GM) is the public facing brand of GMCA Waste & Resources.

We work with local councils in Bolton, Bury, Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Stockport, Tameside and Trafford to inspire and encourage the residents of Greater Manchester to manage their waste and recycling responsibly. We aim to help residents to see the value of waste and the real benefits that can be achieved by wasting less and recycling right. Wigan is not part of R4GM because it administers its own disposal arrangements.

In 2018, we had a number of campaigns running and a busy few months of putting stickers on bins, delivering leaflets to households, speaking to people at events and much more. We then did a survey to see what residents thought of the campaigns, so that we could use the feedback to shape our future campaigns.

The survey was for people living in houses with their own wheelie bins in Bolton, Manchester, Oldham, Salford and Tameside. These were the areas where we delivered the campaigns.

We had 826 responses in total. The results gave us an insight into what residents wanted to see in terms of campaign and communication materials, and what they thought of our previous leaflets, stickers and adverts.

When we asked people how they have received recycling information in the past, 75% said from a bin calendar, 53% said from a sticker on a bin and 53% said from a leaflet.

We then asked what information you would like on a leaflet, 72% said information about what can be put in their recycling bin, and 71% said information about what can’t be put in their recycling bin. Similarly, 75% of people said they wanted a bin sticker to include information about what they can put in their recycling bin.

We also asked residents what they think happens to their general waste, 49% of people said they think it is sent to landfill. However, 30% of respondents were aware that it is used to create electricity.

The results of the survey have been collated and used to develop our campaign ‘Recycling plastic?  It’s got to be a bottle.’

As the results showed that most people have received recycling information from a leaflet or sticker, we decided to use this approach again. So far, we have delivered 292,500 leaflets to households in various districts. By March 2020, we will have delivered 389,500 leaflets.

This meant that we made our campaign leaflets more generic instead of focusing on one type of recycling bin. We have included information on:

• what should and should not go in your mixed recycling bin
• what should go in your other recycling bins and general waste bin at home
• why we only accept plastic bottles for recycling
• what happens to your general waste.

We also included bin stickers and tags for mixed recycling bins as part of our campaigns.

For more information about our current campaigns, please visit: https://recycleforgreatermanchester.com/community/ or search #GotToBeABottle on Twitter.