Butt Ballot Bin
The iconic voting ashtray that gets smokers binning, not littering.
For over a decade, the Butt Ballot Bin made waves across the world – helping 5,000+ communities in 43 countries keep their streets free of cigarette butts – by encouraging smokers to vote on fun and topical questions like “Messi vs. Ronaldo?” or “Cats vs. Dogs”.
It’s not just clever, it works. Studies show cigarette litter drops by up to 73% on average where Butt Ballot Bins are installed.
average reduction in littering
cigarette butts captured
views on social media
countries around the world
The problem
Cigarette butts are the world’s most littered item with 4 million dropped daily in the UK alone. Each one is made of plastic that breaks into microplastics and leaks toxins into waterways.
And it’s one of the most socially acceptable forms of littering, needing creative ideas and smart design to stop it happening.
How it works
Each bin features a customisable, fun, and debate-worthy question – like “Who’s the best footballer in the world: Ronaldo or Messi?”
Smokers cast their vote by dropping their butt into the slot beneath their chosen answer and watch it add to the tally through the clear front panel.
The visible results spark curiosity, friendly competition, and even online chatter – turning littering into a moment of participation.
— Alison Dewey, BID Manager, Southend BID
From Hong Kong to Chile, from football debates to Brexit polls, you’ve helped cut cigarette litter by up to 73%. One butt, one vote, one slightly heated office debate at a time.
And now, after all that voting, debating, and butt-stubbing, Hubbub is closing the polls. We’ve made the decision to stop selling the Ballot Bin directly. But this isn’t the end of the story – sign up for updates on where you might be able to get your hands on one in future.
We want to say a huge thank you. Whether you bought one bin or a hundred, you’ve been part of a genuinely global experiment in making litter prevention fun and proving that smart design can lead to real behaviour change.
Every bin sold has also supported the work of our environmental charity, Hubbub, where we’re making sustainability second nature. Last year alone we inspired someone in the UK to take action on the environment every 9 seconds!
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100% of profits support Hubbub, the environmental charity making sustainability second nature.