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Message of the trash truck: Who needs wetlands when you have garbage dumps

Posted on June 2nd, 2009 – 1:19 PM
By James Shiffer

landfillwildlife.JPGI snapped this photo of a Waste Management truck pulling out of an alley in Minneapolis’s Elliott Park neighborhood. The message intrigued me - don’t feel bad about our disposable society, piles of garbage are good for animals. Apparently it’s not about seagulls. When I excavated a bit further, I learned that the figure refers to land set aside adjacent to the trash giant’s landfills. It’s a partnership with a group called the Wildlife Habitat Council, a 21-year-old nonprofit group that defines itself as “the first cooperative effort between the environmental community and industry.” The TV commercial Waste Management produced makes a landfill look like a pristine wetland - not a disposable diaper in sight.

The feel-good trash truck message is part of the hauler’s multi-million dollar effort to green its image. Garbage is still gold for Waste Management: the company netted $1.08 billion on $13 billion in revenue last year. It employs 45,000, operates 273 landfills and handled 110 million tons of trash last year.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009 at 1:19 pm and is filed under Advertising claims. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

5 Responses to “Message of the trash truck: Who needs wetlands when you have garbage dumps”

  1. Dave Houg Says:
    June 3rd, 2009 at 11:57 am

    If they are paying for buffer land around their landfills - - -
    GOOD FOR THEM

  2. ShifferIsAMoron Says:
    June 6th, 2009 at 9:12 am

    Once again, Shiffer reveals his bias and lack of professionalism.

    For this so-called blog, Shiffer states the propose is to “Your destination for righting wrongs, uncovering injustices big and small and holding people, companies and government accountable”

    What, exactly, is WM doing wrong? The land set aside is NOT the landfill, genius.

    “Feel good” message? Explain again please why you get paid?

  3. Tracy Says:
    June 7th, 2009 at 1:17 pm

    .. Shiffer is fascinated with the stories of regular people and believes in the power of journalism to make their lives better.

    I’m glad to see that reporting the facts is not in his mission statement.

  4. ProjectRunway Says:
    July 11th, 2009 at 4:51 am

    Female fashion models who work with the designers throughout the season are also in the competition. Each week, as the number of designers dwindle, the number of models are also reduced, with one model remaining at the end. Models are randomly pre-assigned to a designer during the first challenge, and from the second challenge onwards, the designers will have an opportunity to pick the model they wish to work with. This usually happens during the start of every episode save for the first, with the winner of the previous challenge receiving first pick, and the other designers picking models in order through host Klum’s random draw of large red shirt buttons with their names stored in a black velvet bag. Though, there are times when only the winning designer will be given the choice to pick with the following choices: either keep his or her previous model, take the losing designer’s model Project Runway from the last challenge, or switch models with another competing designer

  5. MichaellaS Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 4:27 am

    tks for the effort you put in here I appreciate it!

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