The project
Rolling out separate collection of the organic fraction means adding a new bin to the street, but above all introducing a new habit into thousands of homes.
Between 2024 and 2025, COGERSA progressively rolled out the brown bin across different Asturian municipalities, and Spora ran the information, awareness and environmental education campaign that accompanied this process. The project reached 23 concejos, combining new-rollout campaigns with reinforcement actions.
Under the concept “A los marrones, soluciones. Lo hacemos bien, separamos la orgánica” (“Solutions for the brown bin. We do it right, we separate our organic waste”), we built a proximity communication setup able to explain the new system, resolve doubts and, above all, help make separating organic waste part of everyday practice.
A new bin only works when there’s a new habit behind it.
The challenge
Rolling out separate collection of the organic fraction posed a challenge that went far beyond announcing the arrival of the brown bin.
Citizens needed to understand what to separate, why it mattered and, above all, how to fit it into their daily routine. And this had to be done across very different territories, with municipalities of varying size, character and rollout stage.
The campaign had to support both the municipalities starting to separate organic waste and those where the service already existed but where established habits needed reinforcing. Across the three phases, rollouts, reinforcement actions and new rounds of intervention were combined according to the needs detected in each territory.
The challenge, therefore, wasn’t just explaining a new collection system, but creating the conditions for citizens to make it their own.
Methodology
The rollout was designed as a comprehensive information, awareness and support setup, adaptable to the reality of each concejo and to how far along organic-fraction collection already was.
- Door-to-door information and advance outreach, through leaflet drops, municipal signage, printed materials, the website and social media, to anticipate the campaign’s arrival and explain the new service.
- Mobile information point, deployed across the different municipalities as the main space for direct contact with citizens, staffed by environmental educators to inform, resolve doubts and listen to needs.
- Home organic-waste separation kits, made up of a ventilated caddy and compostable bags, linking information with a concrete tool that let people start the habit change right away.
- Door-to-door visits to specific generators, especially shops, food service and other bio-waste-producing activities, with information tailored to each business’s reality.
- Specific information sessions for businesses, to go deeper into how the service works and resolve issues linked to the commercial management of the organic fraction.
- “Embajadores de la orgánica” (“Organic Waste Ambassadors”), an educational activity in primary schools that made students the protagonists of the awareness effort and extended the message to families and the community.
- Monitoring, data collection and evaluation, recording materials delivered, participation, visits, incidents and feedback in order to progressively adapt the rollout.
- Reinforcement campaigns and second and third rounds, returning to municipalities where habits needed consolidating, barriers needed addressing or participation needed increasing.
In this way, the campaign wasn’t limited to announcing the arrival of the brown bin — it built a network of contact with homes, businesses, schools and administrations to support the change before, during and after rollout.
Results
The territorial rollout combined breadth with proximity. Across the three phases, the information points served 18,432 people and distributed 17,086 home kits to help separate the organic fraction at home.
The campaign also reached the local economy directly, with 1,050 specific waste-generating businesses visited, allowing personalized information for shops and businesses and identifying specific barriers linked to managing their bio-waste.
Beyond the figures, the project generated valuable feedback from the territory. Citizens particularly valued the clarity of the information and the ease provided for starting or improving organic waste separation, while direct contact made it possible to detect factors affecting participation, such as the availability and location of bins or emptying frequency.
Learnings
New collection systems are rolled out on the street. New habits, at home. A rollout campaign can’t end when the bin is installed. It has to last until the moment a person understands the change, has the tools to take part and makes separation part of their daily life.
The project confirms for us the importance of combining a shared identity with a flexible intervention, able to adapt to different municipalities and rollout stages; of pairing mass communication with personal contact; and of working simultaneously with citizens, businesses and the education community.
It also shows the value of returning to the territories. Reinforcement actions and second and third rounds mean communication isn’t just the starting signal for a service, but a tool for consolidating behaviors, detecting barriers and continuing to improve participation.