Rod: SBB sets its littering campaign to music
Anyone walking through the concourse of Zurich’s main train station on Tuesday was treated to a musical performance. A quintet performed classical masterpieces for SBB—on instruments made from trash.
Music students from the Zurich University of the Arts ZHDK played pieces from Bach to Mozart to Wagner. And all of this on instruments made of trash and junk. Visually, the quintet was more reminiscent of well-dressed Guggenmusik. Acoustically, however, the high quality of the performances was astonishing. The brass violins, the aluminum viola and the oil barrel bass did not tarnish the classics of the old masters in any way. Quite the contrary - and so countless passers-by listened spellbound to the lovely sounds.
About a year ago, SBB introduced waste separation boxes at the five largest stations with the aim of recycling recyclable materials to a high standard. After one year, SBB considers the results to be a complete success: the goal of achieving a separation rate of 25 percent has been clearly exceeded. By the end of 2015, the separation rate will have leveled off at around 42 percent. In absolute terms, this means 855 tons of residual waste (58 percent), 171 tons of PET (12 percent), 75 tons of aluminum (5 percent) and 373 tons of paper (25 percent) across all major train stations in Switzerland.
The classical concert was the preliminary highlight of SBB's anti-litter campaign. Planned and implemented by Rod Kommunikation. Jan-Hendrik Völker-Albert, Head of Marketing & Sustainability at SBB, is delighted with the success of the campaign: "With this concert, we wanted to thank our customers for their commitment to keeping trains and stations clean. On the other hand, we wanted to draw attention to the fact that separated waste is a valuable material. In fact, it is so valuable that it can even be used to create something as valuable as classical music. We were very pleased with the many positive reactions."
Responsible at SBB: Dr. Jan-Hendrik Völker-Albert (Head of Strategy, Marketing and Sustainability), Myriam Siksou (Head of Group Marketing), Monica Cabano (Communications Manager Passenger Traffic); Social Media: Christina Schmid, Sarah Georg, Livio Stöckli.
