LinkedIn post showing pile of trash in Amsterdam prompts city-wide clean-up campaign
An Amsterdam local posting a photo of a pile of trash on Utrechtstestraat on LinkedIn has prompted a city-wide clean-up campaign. The first clean-up day will be held on September 19, organized by local businesses and backed by the municipality and local politicians, initiator Victor Knaap announced in a follow-up post on LinkedIn.
According to Knaap, the co-founder of the marketing agency Monks, his initial post, conveying the “annoyance that somehow we’ve become so antisocial that we throw everything on the street,” blew up to over 500,000 people seeing it. “That’s 50% of Amsterdam,” he said.
From the hundreds of comments stemmed the idea to do something about it. “Let’s pick a day to clean up the city together. It needs to be fun, social, and we need to lead by example,” said one commenter, Charlie MacGregor of Social Hub.
Knaap decided to do just that. His agency set up a special team and reached out to local businesses and city officials. “We’re in talks with the municipality, politicians, government officials, and even Alderman Hester van Buren responded immediately.” The goal is to motivate at least 3.5 percent of Amsterdam residents to help clean up the entire city on September 19.
“We're not opening a new foundation, establishing a political party, fundraising, or organizing galas; we're going to carry out this cleanup by helping to scale existing initiatives,” Knaap said. “So much good is already happening, and so many people are selflessly working to keep their sidewalks, neighborhoods, or containers clean.”
