Organization

TRASH TALK is a non-profit organization aimed at reducing landfill waste through recycling, waste diversion and composting.

project duration

April 3rd, 2023 - May 30th, 2023 (9 weeks)

Research Team

Leah- Heaney-Ford

Jacqueline Barragan-Abed

Maggie Logan

Kelly Geier

study background

From reducing green house gas emissions to cost savings, composting offers many benefits for individuals and communities.

However, 72% of American households do not compost.

There is growing interest in composting by individuals, with one study reporting that 67% of its respondents said they would compost if it were more convenient to do so.

Our goal: Better understand the barriers to entry for people who would like to compost and the hurdles confronted by those who currently compost so that we can create a solution that encourages and eases the burdens of residential composting.

targeted audience

Young adults (18 - 26 years of age) and millennials (27-42 years of age) who are interested in making more sustainable choices and are interested in using smartphone applications for resources.

Research methods

Field Studies

Interviews

Survey

Card Sorting

Research findings

approach

Eight participants, including five composters and three non-composters.

Focused observations on the different tools, supplies and resources that participants are currently using to dispose of trash, recyclables and compostable materials.

Observed how users transport or collect their waste, how they decide what to recycle or compost versus toss and collected insights on the pain points and emotions associated with the waste disposal process.

Findings

All composting participants used some sort of countertop or kitchen compost bin to collect scraps. From there, participants used either a pick-up service or backyard composting set-up.

Backyard composters used more tools to successfully compost (including checking pH levels, using a screen, etc).

For resources, participants reported using provided city/municipal guides, books and Reddit’s r/composting community. Participants noted that more robust resources were often intimidating.

Participants were not always confident that they had correctly separated their household waste.

Users had different options and requirements for waste disposal depending on their state, city, country, or housing complex.

Some users had issues with their supplies, a potential opportunity to share information on which supplies performed the best.

Users did not always make an effort to research an item before disposing of it.

approach

Eight participants, including three composters and five non-composters.

Focused questions to composters on how they feel about their composting practice, hurdles they face when composting, what they find rewarding and how they find information and perceive impact.

Focused questions to non-composters on if they’ve ever explored it, what’s kept them from trying composting and how they get information about composting today and what impact they think composting has.

Findings

Primarily use web-based methods for composting information.

Current composters overwhelmingly shared not needing informational resources.

All participants used municipal services for their garbage and recycling pick-up. They also noted the ease and perceived impact of recycling when comparing to their idea of composting.

Several participants shared that a financial incentive would motivate them to compost.

There are a range of emotions around composting, from disgust to shame, fear and concern, but also pride for those who saw their efforts as successful.

Non-composting participants showed a lack knowledge around composting.

The positive impact on the environment is a significant motivator to compost.

External pressure was also noted as a motivator to begin composting.

Barriers in adoption include the perception that apartment composting is another chore, hard to do in an apartment, has a high start-up cost, and the assumption that it’s only for homeowners and the wealthy.

Approach

55 total respondents from across our target user group.

16 questions focused on understanding more about the age, housing type, household size and composting habits of our target users.

Gauged our target users’ understanding of composting impacts and their interest level in different composting topics.

Used filtering logic to remove users who had no interest in helping the environment, don’t use smartphone apps or that fell outside our target group.

Findings

34.5% of our respondents compost at some level.

Even neutral or somewhat interested in sustainability reported an interest in composting.

Participants living in a single home were more likely to compost that those living in other housing types.

83.3% of composters use backyard composting.

The most common type of composting respondents expressed an interest in was also backyard composting.

50.9% of all respondents said they would prefer to use compost for their garden or house plants versus disposing of waste through a service or drop-off site.

Users indicating an interest in sustainability also reported that a composting pick up service or drop-off was also of interest.

Most participant understood the two main benefits of composting: reduced waste in landfills (89.1%) and soil enrichment (83.6%).

The information category with the most interest was “What to do with compost.”

Nearly 60% of our sample population in the category of “interested in sustainability” and “interested in learning how to compost”, roughly 36% could be considered intermediate composters and 4% avid composters.

user personas & scenarios

Scenario 1: Steven Chen

Steven Chen picks up Chipotle take-out on his way home from work. He tells the cashier that he doesn’t need any plastic utensils. He eats his meal at home while he face times a friend. He scrapes his leftover food scraps into his countertop compost bin. He speaks into the Google voice search to check if the burrito bowl is compostable. The bottom is, but the aluminum foil is recyclable. He is frustrated that he has to research what to do with these items. He folds the bottom and puts it into the compost bin and rinses out the top and throws it into the recycling bin. He’s not sure of the paper cup can be composted but he squashes it into the compost bin anyways. Steven feels good about trying to compost but not confident that he’s correctly disposed of everything.

Scenario 2: Alicia Cortes

Alicia Cortes orders her grocery delivery while she’s sitting at her daughter’s soccer match. By the time she returns home, her groceries are sitting on her doorstep. She fills a pot of water to start dinner. She prepares pasta with parmesan because it’s a favorite for a family of picky eaters. She’s not sure if she can recycle the pasta box with the plastic so she tosses that in the garbage. She throws the cheese rinds in the garbage too. She cleans up the kitchen while the kids eat. The kids don’t finish their meals so Alicia takes a few bites and then scrapes the rest of the leftovers into the garbage disposal. She feels guilty about wasting food and makes a mental note to check what she should do with her food scraps and packaging next time.

Scenario 3: Doug Stroupe

Doug Stroupe stops by the farmer’s market on his way home from work for some potatoes and onions. He carries his items in a reusable bag. When he gets home, he heads outside to his garden to harvest some carrots. He rinses, peels and chops the vegetables he makes sure nothing goes to waste and only the unusable parts of the vegetables are placed in the countertop composting bin. He prepares a soup. he sits down at the dinner table and eats with his partner. There is plenty of leftover soup, so Doug stores the rest in airtight constainers in the freezer. He labels the containers with an expiration date. He feels accomplished that he was able to minimize the amount of wasted food. He notices an expired soup in the back of the fridge. he takes that to the outdoor compost bin. he feels guilty about wasting the expired soup and makes a mental note to consume his leftovers before cooking new meals next time.

Approach

A total of 10 participants were involved in the card sort study.

Participants were allowed to come up with their own categories to be able to sort through 20 different cards covering various topics on composting.

The goal was to understand common term used by our targeted audience and how they organize key information in order to inform the design content of our app.

Findings

From the responses, as a team we categorized the responses into our own card sort after noticing that many of our respondents used similar labels to categorize the cards. What used to be 36 unique category labels, it was concluded to incorporate 5 unique categories for the app.