Congratulations, you’ve made an event! Now what?

Congratulations, you’ve created a Trashpacker event, now what?

The idea is simple: Let’s collect 100.000 bin bags full of trash and make it go viral! Of course this is going to be a competition. Who collected the most bin bags in one year? You can find your score back on the leaderboard. The more bin bags, the higher your score! Are you going to be the Trashpacker of the year?

Let’s help you with that!

BUT FIRST ATTENTION:

– Pictures of your binbags are only valid when you show the letter T somewhere!!! (Write it in the sand/form a T with your arms/make a T from the plastic you’ve found/make a letter T with your collected bin bags. Be creative!)

– Make a clear picture of the bin bags!!!: Don’t pile them up, but leave some space between the bin bags so we can easily count them!’

Here is a manual of how to organize a cleanup. These are only guidelines that can help you, although you are free to do it differently.

1. Location and day

First the basics: Where are you going to clean and when are you going to clean? The sooner you plan your cleanup, the more participants you can arrange. Give yourself enough time to get everything ready.

2. Sponsors?

You can host a self-sustaining cleanup where Trashpackers need to bring their own supplies. But always give it try to find a sponsor!

Sponsors might supply your cleanup with bin bags, water, gloves or pickers. Think about companies near the location you want to cleanup or the public work department.

3. Where to bring the trash

If there are no dumpsters like at the beach sometimes, then who’s going to pick up your collected bin bags? Contact your local waste management facility. You have a big chance that they’re happy to help so you can arrange a pick up for free.

4. Participants and promotion

Advertise your cleanup! Create an event on Facebook or use any other online platform with the following details:

– Location

– What day and time (don’t make the cleanup longer than an hour or two)

– That it’s a self-sustaining cleanup (unless you arranges supplies by a sponsor). So participants need to bring their own:

– Bin bags, enough water, food, gloves, sunscreen and possibly trash-pickers

– Remind them to don’t bring any plastic as the cleanup can function as an example to bystanders. So reusable bottles,
– Announce the opportunity to use the app Litterati during the cleanup (for more information, see below the manual at point 8. ‘Extra’)
– Ask people to help you with sharing your cleanup. Call your local newspaper/radio or municipal council. They might want to help you with the promotion of your cleanup event, to get more people involved! If you’re a backpacker, try to ask your hostel for some help!

You can also copy the link of this cleanup on your Facebook.

5. Briefing

When everybody arrived, start with a briefing. If you have a lot of participants then divide it in smaller groups. Decide where to collect the bin bags (for example on the spot where you want to make the group picture).

Tell them they can have a break anytime they want or decide a time when you have a break together.

Remind everybody of their safeness:

– don’t pick up small pieces of glass or needles

– Don’t approach dangerous spots like stepping on slippery rocks.

– Rehydrate yourself.

If you would like to help with research, inform your participants to keep in mind how much types of trash they’ll find. After your cleanup they can give an estimation in percentages what kind of trash they find like;

how much plastic bags/bottles/cans/styrofoam etcetera. This is information with a high value for scientific research!

6. Donate your bin bags!

When you’ve collected all the bin bags, don’t forget to upload a picture of it to your Trashpackers profile and fill in the information from your cleanup

– Make a clear picture of your bin bags so we can see how many bags you’ve collected (don’t trow them all on one pile, but safe some space so we can count them)

– Show somewhere on this picture the letter T from Trashpackers, so we know it is an recent picture. You can write a letter T in the sand, make it with trash, form it with your arms. Be creative!

– Make a group picture

– Upload your pictures to the event under your Trashpackers profile and fill in the follow information:

* Date

* Location

* How many bin bags you’ve collected

* How many participants joined your cleanup

* Super Trashpackers fill in the form for scientific research!

7. Check out your score on the leaderboard!

Extra: The app Litterati
Help us to work with companies to find ecofriendly and sustainable solutions! Track your impact as you tag and upload photos of the litter you collect. Geo-tagging provides insight into problem areas and highlights the most active Litterati communities. Keyword tags identify the most commonly found brands and products. We all need to play our part.
* Download the Litterati app at www.litterati.org
* Go to ‘more’ – to ‘clubs’ – ‘Sign up at a club’ and fill in ‘Trashpackers Community’ and join! Or when you’ve downloaded the app, here is a direct link to the Trashpackers Community: https://link.litterati.org/clubs/1986
* Take a photo of each piece of litter that you collect and dispose
* Add tags to each litter photo for item and/or brand type
* Upload the photos so the data can be tracked in the Digital Landfill database
* Track your personal impact and that of the Litterati community

For an easy overview how to use litterati: see this file!