A recyclable post was an impossible idea until we worked out how to hack media formats to make it happen, bringing to life the long term impact of keeping even one can in the recycling system. Thanks to that thinking, and a real focus on the details of the interactions we invited, our media budget worked doubly hard, not only buying us reach, but setting off chain reactions of sharing that supercharged it.

From gym bags to handbags, bathroom cabinets to desk drawers, look in any of them and you’ll probably find a can of Sure - the world’s top selling anti-perspirant. But while everyone knows Sure won’t let you down, not enough people know they can recycle their cans.

In a time when brands are looking to be more sustainable, Sure already is. We just needed to find an interesting way to let people know.

RT to Recycle was created as a response to consumers' lack of awareness that their deodorant cans are recyclable.

In partnership with Twitter, we created the world’s first ‘recyclable’ tweet, an activation that started with a simple Tweet of a Sure can.

Thanks to a unique Twitter’s auto reply functionality, when that image was retweeted, it became a different aluminium item, showcasing all the things a deodorant can can become: from wheels to water bottles, hoops to hurdles, lamps to walking frames…

With Sure cans present in homes across the UK, we wanted to spread the word of their recyclability far and wide - on a limited budget.

With over 40% of the UK’s household waste already being recycled, we didn’t need to engage our audience with recycling as a concept. And in the period around Earth day when we planned to go live, we knew they’d already be bombarded by sobering messaging.

So rather than add to their guilt and eco-fatigue, we chose to adopt a different approach. out went the hard-hitting facts and stats, and in came an altogether more playful and charming approach.

The mechanic was simple: a promoted tweet, and an invitation to #RTtoRecycle. Each RT ‘recycled’ the aerosol can into a different aluminium item, allowing users to tweet as many objects as they wanted, using Twitter’s auto-reply functionality.

In a Twitter first, we daisy-chained auto-reply mechanics to make every subsequent tweet interactive, too: enabling users to engage more deeply with the story of the recycled can’s potential journey.

The retweets unleashed a chain of tweets invading the platform with thousands of all the aluminium objects a Sure can can be once recycled.

And with each RT, we lengthened the brand interaction and increased our chances of landing our message: potential exposures beyond our original media buy soared.

Our campaign kicked off with a big impact. We achieved a reach of 5.1 million, with more than 1.1 million views of our videos.

Within 3 days of launch, over 1100 objects had been revealed. After that first engagement, many went on to follow the can's journey further: with 'RTtoRecyclers' each retweeting twice on average. And despite the campaign's UK focus, twitter users from 17 different countries got involved.