With the 2023 Rugby World Cup being hosted in France, French telecommunications company Orange leveraged its sponsorship of the event to drive awareness of its smartphone recycling program. The company collaborated with environmentally driven brands to transform smartphones into medals that would ultimately be worn by the world's top rugby players.
The objective for Orange's campaign was to increase the number of recycled mobile phones and demonstrate to the French the value of recycling their old smartphones.
Orange is committed to environmental sustainability and building a more responsible digital world. One of the ways the brand works to help the environment is through the collection of used digital devices.
To this end, in 2020 Orange launched its recycling program "Re." However, three years later the French still weren't recycling their old cell phones, and they were even skeptical about the process.
Orange's main target audience were French rugby fans. Ultimately, the brand's goal was to reach as many people in France as possible, something that one of the most popular sports in the county would guarantee.
Orange has always been a supporter of rugby. In 2020, the brand announced that it would be an official sponsor of the 2023 Rugby World Cup France and supply all the telecommunications services needed for the event.
Through this sponsorship, Orange wanted to positively influence the sport, society, and the planet. The purpose of the sponsorship was to make the World Cup an environmentally responsible competition and minimize the environmental footprint of its network infrastructure.
Rugby is one of the most followed sports in France and the country serving as the host nation for the 2023 World Cup provided the perfect context to attract the attention of a skeptical audience and illustrate the benefits of recycling their phones.
Orange's big idea was to turn a mobile phone into a rugby medal — but this was not easy. The brand needed partners that aligned with its purposeful objective — it developed a process that was as environmentally responsible as possible.
For the reception and sorting of phones, the brand worked with Ateliers du Bocage, a social cooperative organization focused on job creation in the areas of e-waste, recycling, and reuse.
To extract the metals from the smartphones, Orange worked with WeeeCycling — a company that restores metals to their original qualities and then transforms them into new materials and products.
For the raw material preparation, metal molding, and peeling, the brand worked with Lebronze Alloys — a company specialized in the production of semi-finished and finished products in technical high-performance copper and nickel alloys with a focus in ecology, sustainability, and circular economy.
For the final step, Orange worked with la Monnaie de Paris, the world's oldest continuously running minting institution, which shaped and polished the medals.
First, Orange had to encourage people to join its initiative so it could collect old smartphones. To this end, the brand created a video, featuring French rugby player and brand ambassador Sébastien Chabal. Orange partnered with all the rugby clubs in France to turn them into collection points where players could drop their old smartphones. Orange stores were also collection points.
Once Orange had transformed the smartphones to medals, it organized a press event at la Monnaie de Paris where it invited the Minister of Sport, numerous journalists, and influencers.
Because the French only believe what they see, the brand recorded the recycling process and created a video to show them step by step how it works.
To spread the word, it selected the most iconic French rugby players that shared the initiative on their social media accounts.
During the Rugby World Cup, in the fan zones, Orange showed the video illustrating the recycling process on the same big screens where fans watch the games.
At the end of the match, onlookers saw the smartphones turned medals worn by the world's top rugby players, making the French aware of the value of their old phones.
Orange's commitment to the environment goes back to 2020, when they launched its recycling program. However, in 2023 the figures showed that the initiative wasn't catching on. People still didn't completely believe in the benefits of recycling their old smartphones and did not fully trust the process. However, Orange found a creative solution that mobilized its target audience and made them believe in recycling.
The campaign results included:
