Case Study

Waverley Borough Council

Background

Waverley Borough Council wanted to encourage residents to recycle more of their household waste and introduced a controversial alternate weekly collection scheme. It was extremely important to have a smooth transition period for residents, as the Council wanted to maintain its public support as well as increase participation in order to meet tough new recycling rates.

DTW Vavasour also had to train Councillors to work with the media and cater to opposing political persuasions within each group.

Brief

DTW Vavasour was asked to provide PR and Marketing support to the Council as they launched the new scheme, with particular focus on media relations support. While the public is generally sympathetic to the need for recycling, alternate weekly collections have not always been well received.

DTW Vavasour was tasked with generating positive publicity in order to encourage residents to understand and accept the scheme and maximise participation rates.

Approach

DTW Vavasour developed a series of key messages for the campaign, focusing on a simple theme: change needs to happen. The campaign aimed to educate local residents and the media about the need to recycle and about the wider issues involved. At the same time, the message was kept at a very personal and local level, reassuring local residents during a time of controversial change.

There were three key phases in the PR campaign:

• the announcement of the new scheme and the education of the Council's residents
• the roll out of the scheme and encouraging residents' participation
• the demonstration of the success of the scheme, fighting any remaining negative attitudes.

DTW Vavasour delivered a schedule of pro-active press releases over a ten month period. The agency also worked alongside the Council to produce a series of core literature devised in order to engage with stakeholders and residents. This included a Frequently Asked Questions document used to keep responses consistent with the questions coming from both the media and local residents.

In addition, DTW Vavasour assisted Waverley Borough Council in writing a leaflet to be delivered to residents detailing the roll out of the new collection scheme and advised the Council on the design and layout of the leaflet.

Outcomes

The service was introduced smoothly, with high levels of resident participation. For the first time, Waverley residents recycled more than 30% of all household waste. Waverley Borough Council also had extremely low levels of contamination in the waste collected for recycling; proving that residents had not only supported the wider messages about the need to recycle, but had also shown understanding into how recycling was working at a local level.

The PR campaign was a great success, during which DTW Vavasour maintained a press cuttings database used to analyse media activity surrounding the scheme. Cuttings with an AVE of over £20,000 were generated during this time. Key messages were vigorously promoted in the media and the profile of Waverley Borough Council and the Portfolio Holder were significantly raised.

Following the introduction of the scheme, the public demand for further kerbside recycling facilities increased dramatically, putting the Council in a great position for the future.

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