Olmsted County Environmental Resources: Waste Reduction Campaign

Olmsted County Environmental Resources (OCER) is the waste management department for Rochester, MN, and the surrounding communities. To change the public’s waste behavior, OCER sought a partner to develop and implement a multi-year Waste Diversion Campaign to increase public awareness and participation in waste reduction, recycling, composting, and reuse.

Campaign Strategy Campaign Design Messaging Media Strategy, Planning, & Buying Media Buying Digital Strategy

Four posters on a concrete wall titled Its Up To You from Olmsted County, Minnesota, each showing a reusable item above a pattern of its single-use plastic or paper counterpart.

The Challenge

Close the gap between intention and action.

Recent waste audits showed that large quantities of recyclable and compostable materials were still being disposed of. Olmsted County aimed to address this through a marketing effort targeting diverse audiences: single-family households, multifamily units, schools, and businesses. The goal was to increase public awareness, participation, and understanding of Olmsted County’s Environmental Resources programs, services, and priorities.

Two billboards for Olmsted County Sustainability, one featuring silverware and one featuring crumpled paper, both with the text ITS UP TO YOU.

The Approach

Empower, don’t instruct.

People don’t like being told what to do. This challenge is something all public service campaigns face when weighing awareness against assertion. Framing change as a choice between two contrasting options empowers the audience rather than instructing them.

To change people’s waste habits, you need to start at the beginning. We determined that the greatest impact would come from motivating the community to make the right choices at the moment they were about to generate waste. Buying decisions, choices between paper and plastic, clothing waste—all were potential areas where a proactive decision could prevent waste from being created in the first place. The creative highlighted contrasting waste decisions side by side under the tagline “It’s Up to You.” The scale of the impact was driven home visually by showing a single item representing the more environmentally beneficial choice against the large amount of waste the alternative could generate. The design also built on and expanded the county’s branding, staying consistent while giving the campaign a bolder, friendlier feel.

Two mobile phone screens displaying an advertisement for Olmsted County Sustainability, alongside a Waste Reduction Guide chart comparing single-use items with sustainable alternatives.

The Results

A bold reintroduction

The “It’s Up to You” campaign delivered more than 22 million impressions. Visits to the campaign landing page grew from 184 in the month before launch to 5,600 in the first month. Paid social drove landing-page views at $0.44 each, against a typical benchmark of $1.50 to $3. Furthermore, the It’s Up To You theme and design direction equipped the department with a memorable, unified system to build future campaigns and educational efforts on for years to come. Fieldtrip continues to work with OCER on future campaigns.

Two side-by-side billboard advertisements by Olmsted County Sustainability, one showing a reusable water bottle against plastic bottles and one showing a reusable tote bag against plastic bags, both with the text Its up to you.