Design Memo

Recycling and Reducing Waste in NYC

For our last two week assignment, we addressed issues of recycling and waste in New York City. Working from preliminary data we were given, we had to identify a particular part of the recycling and waste problem that we wanted to work on; I chose to address the overwhelming amount of junk mail that New Yorker’s receive on an annual basis. I felt that this subject was compelling because whereas other forms of waste from necessary acts such as eating, the waste that comes from junk mail seems superfluous. Junk mail (ie. catalogs, donation solicitations, telephone directories, credit card applications, etc.) is generally unwanted–it’s the pieces of mail that we never ask to get, but receive anyway. The fact that so many trees are being use in order to generate this unwanted mail struck me as perplexing, and I wanted to further explore the situation to see how junk mail generation could be reduced and what each of us could do to help.

The basic structure of project was to ultimately create an approximately minute long video that highlights the problem (in this case junk mail), break the problem down by giving the audience comparable data, and then offer actionable solutions on how this problem can be addressed or improved.

My video features “Pat the Postman”—I decided to use Pat as a character that the audience can follow throughout the film. Videos that I feel are successful in communicating information (as seen in my blog posting) create a sense of a narrative, and often times the use of a character helps the audience to connect and understand the big idea being shown. The premise of the work is that Pat, a long time postman in NY, realizes just how much junk mail people are getting, and perplexed by his realization, decides to do some research on the topic. Below is my research/data, my storyboard for the video, and the final piece.

*featured song in video is Peter, Bjorn and John “Second Chance”

RESEARCH

SEQUENCE OF FACTS—REDUCING JUNK MAIL in NYC

GENERAL

+ New York City’s residents produce 12,000 tons of waste everyday

+ Nearly ¼ of all New York City’s waste is recyclable paper, and 90% of printing/writing paper still comes from virgin tree fiber

FOCUS

+ The United States Postal Service delivers +80 billion pieces of direct mail each year (includes ads, catalogs, telephone directories, credit card apps, solicitations for donation, etc.)

+ This equals 4 million tons of paper; if 17 trees make up one ton of paper, 4 million tons equals 68 million trees!

+ Nearly ½ of this junk is never even opened—that’s 2 million tons of paper being wasted= 34 million trees!

+ The average American household receives 848 pieces of junk mail a year

+ Imagine: in NYC, there are some 7,056,860 households! (2000 census)

PROBLEM

+ How can we stop being overwhelmed at the mailbox—and reduce the production of junk mail altogether?

SOLUTIONS

+ Ways to get your address off mailing lists:

+ When you donate money, buy products/services, fill out warranty cards, write out in large letters “please do not sell my name or address” so that companies will note this in their computer systems

+ Take your name off mailing lists, by registering with Direct Mail Marketing Association—choose the mail you want to receive, and eliminate the useless mail

+ Reduce catalog waste by registering with Catalog Choice

SOURCES

+ The Iowa DNR Forestry website

+ www.grownyc.org

+ http://forestmanagement.enr.gov.nt.ca/forest_education/amazing_tre e_facts.htm

+ www.obviously.com/junkmail

+ Central Park website

+ Madison Square Garden website

+ census.gov

STORYBOARD

VIDEO