My Work

Case Study: PA Fights Dirty

While 97 percent of Pennsylvanians say littering is unacceptable, 40 to 50 percent of Pennsylvanians litter. Keep Pennsylvania Beautiful, the PA Department of Environmental Protection, and the PA Department of Transportation sought to create an educational campaign raising awareness of the small actions everyone can take to eliminate litter.

Using data collected in a comprehensive litter study, I oversaw the creation and implementation of a statewide anti-litter campaign that spoke to the demographics most likely to litter while maintaining broad appeal across the whole population. The result?

PA Fights Dirty.

We received positive feedback on PA Fights Dirty immediately because it spoke to the hardscrabble nature of Pennsylvanians while uniting them in a shared mission.

The first iteration of the campaign, “Every Litter Bit Matters,” focused on litter smaller than 4 inches in size because these tiny pieces stack up to 85 percent of litter in Pennsylvania. The campaign’s call to action was for all people to take little actions to prevent little litter—for example, disposing of cigarette butts properly or taking a few extra steps to a trash can that’s not overflowing.

We selectively deployed the campaign during the start of travel season because the majority of litter came from vehicles. Our media buy included spaces commonly seen by vehicle users, such as billboards and PA Turnpike advertisements. We also tapped partnerships with business organizations to have PA Fights Dirty logo stickers placed in key areas, such as on gas pump trash cans.

To show how litter stacks up, our team collected litter from roadways and filled plexiglas windows in bus shelters. Several stop-motion video advertisements were created using this real litter.

We used advertising targeting to get our message in front of the population that most frequently litters: Males in their late teens and early 20s. This included display, social media, and streaming video ads.

PA Fights Dirty received a National Gold ADDY from the American Advertising Foundation, and an Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS) Mid-Atlantic Chapter.