Hey, What’s in Your Compost? Interview Findings
In the second project phase, we’re getting the dirt on people’s attitudes and behaviors around disposing of their food scraps and composting.
“Hi! Do you have a few minutes to tell me about your waste?” It turns out this is not the smoothest conversation starter.
But with clipboards in hand, that’s exactly what we asked people at Lake Merritt on a Sunday afternoon. We asked around to get Oaklanders’ attitudes around composting. (And don’t worry, we workshopped better intros as the day went on.)
After gathering interviews as well as survey results, we distilled people’s responses into six major patterns:
1. Snooping — “I keep tabs on my neighbors.”
We notice what our neighbors do — especially in apartment buildings where people live in close quarters, and share things like walls and waste bins.
Sometimes the observations can be frustrating. “I see trash overflowing in my apartment complex and the compost is pretty much empty, so I know my neighbors aren’t really composting.” Others see neighbors composting incorrectly, or tossing straight up trash into green bins.
But sometimes, our neighbors are doing “better” than us — this can be a powerful lever too. In this example about energy use from a talk with Deena Rosen, when people’s energy use was compared to their neighbors’ on energy bills, it motivated a way bigger reduction in energy use.
- Our takeaway: How might we leverage that energy of competition for good? Or build on the power of community?
2. Confused — “I never learned this / can’t remember”
Many respondents (about half of our random street interviews) didn’t compost and seemed very unfamiliar with the concept, even though there’s a city-wide compost system. A couple of respondents didn’t seem to know that compost can be made from food scraps and only associated it with gardening: One respondent said, “Composting is for plants and veggies, and I don’t really do that.”
Even respondents who have composted for years still question if certain items can be composted. “I never know if the weird stuff like avocado and date seeds are compostable, and I always forget after cooking to look it up.” For another respondent, chopsticks were a mystery. They also don’t feel info is readily available to check quickly in the moment.
And findings from a 2015 StopWaste survey support this. Twenty-six percent of residents couldn’t correctly identify any of the six key waste items as belonging in their green bins, and 42% were not correctly disposing of any of the six waste items.
- Our takeaway: How might we educate and engage people about composting in spaces they’re already excited about and comfortable in?
3. Curious — “I wonder what happens to my composted food scraps.”
“I wish I knew what was happening to the compost and if it is actually helping the environment, as I do it for environmental reasons,” said one respondent. Many people who have composted for a long time still wonder if it’s doing any good: “As long as I’ve composted, I really have no idea how effective it is.” They want to know what happens to the compost — proof that their weekly efforts are building toward something, helping the cause.
There is also a raw curiosity. “I don’t know how to do it but I’d like to learn… It’s kinda fascinating.”
- Our takeaway: How might we show people the full cycle of compost? And share their progress/the impact of their actions with them?
4. Easy — “I like things that are convenient.”
Easy is powerful. We all want easy. This was the most common response in surveys and interviews — 11/15 survey respondents would be interested in a solution that’s easy and reduces the ick factor.
And unfortunately, composting is currently especially inconvenient in apartments. “We put our masks on, grab our building keys, and go down 3 flights of stairs, all to take out our compost,” one respondent said with frustration. And sometimes when the compost is full, “It gets full at about a week but we’re too lazy to take it down for some days, so we might not compost in the interim.” Others “let it overflow after it gets full, which gets messy.”
- Our takeaway: How might we make composting even easier than throwing out trash?
5. Clean — “I keep a clean kitchen.”
This brings us to clean. People like to keep clean homes.
But composting, which is by definition a “mixture of various decaying organic substances, such as dead leaves or manure, used for fertilizing soil” is inherently messy.
For some, their composting bags biodegrade and bottom out when they’re carrying them to the big green bin, spewing food scraps everywhere. Another frustrated respondent describes his experience while cooking: “S$*t gets on the floor, I have raw egg on my hands and have to touch multiple doors to get to the bin. It’s really annoying.”
People have found their own ways to try and keep it clean. One puts those food scraps down the garbage disposal instead, since it’s already a part of his cooking flow. Some put their compost in the freezer, or outside.
And some respondents love that their trash doesn’t smell as bad, because of composting.
- Our takeaway: How might we create a cleaner compost bin setup?
6. Virtue — “I want to do what’s best for the planet and people.”
In Oakland in particular, there are many fiercely loyal composters. We’ll call them “power composters.”
Most people, if they do already compost, are motivated by environmental impacts, reduced waste to landfill and that it’s “the right thing to do.” These people are motivated by virtue — and are surprised when others aren’t.
People who compost want to help their neighbors and want to make the system better: “I wish that everyone could understand how important [composting] is and that it doesn’t make things harder for them to do it.” These people also want compost to expand into other cities across the US. “How do we help other municipalities start compost pick up?”
- Our takeaway: How might we leverage or further empower this energy from power composters?
Method to the madness: our interview approach
Goal of interviews: To understand apartment building tenants’ current behaviors and attitudes about composting, the challenges they face and how the experience could be better.
Timing: Over 3 weeks
Methods of interviews
- Online survey: 20 responses
- Guerilla interviews: 7 responses
- Formal in-depth interviews: 4 responses
- Surveys from other institutions (i.e. StopWaste 2015 survey)
Why we interview: People who experience a problem have the clearest picture of what the current problem is. They experience it every day, and they are the ones we are trying to help, to make this aspect of their lives easier/better/more delightful.
What’s next
Next, we’ll also be interviewing apartment property managers about their experience. After that, we’ll use these takeaways as jumping off points to develop and prototype ideas for solutions to continue to improve composting rates in Oakland and beyond. Read more in our next post.
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This article is part 2 in a series looking at food waste in Oakland with a human-centered design lens. You can read our first post here, where we lay down the context of the problem and where Oakland is currently at with composting rates.
