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Panoramic view on the North Campus © Jürgen Huhn​/​TU Dortmund
“Smash the Box Challenge”

Students Present Ideas for Sustainable, Reusable Solutions

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The winning team of the Smash the Box Challenge can be seen in a hall with high ceilings © Social Research Center Dortmund
The teams of the “Smash the Box Challenge” together with the project managers and the expert jury.
How can it be achieved that Dortmund citizens and food service establishments use reusable dishes throughout the city? In the idea competition “Smash the Box Challenge”, students spent four months developing new answers to this question. At the final event on 15 March, two students of the Department of Spatial Planning – Reda Abdelilah and Rahmat Hidayat – were able to convince the jury with their concept for a return machine that dispenses reusable cups, accepts them back, and also washes them itself.

As part of individual coaching, the winning team will now be able to concretize this idea and check to what extent it is feasible. The final event of the competition was organized by the Social Research Center Dortmund (Sozialforschungsstelle, sfs) and the Center for Entrepreneurship and Transfer (CET) of TU Dortmund University together with the Office for Economic Development and the Environment Office of the city. Thus, the final pitches were embedded in a diverse program of lectures and work phases on the topic of reuse.

In order to reduce waste and promote environmental protection, food service establishments have been obliged for a good year now to also offer reusable containers for food and drinks that they sell outside the facility or at events. Students from all disciplines and semesters were invited to develop socially innovative ideas in the “Smash the Box Challenge” on how this so-called “reusable offer obligation” can be implemented sustainably. “The Social Research Center Dortmund has been researching social innovations for years. This means that social challenges can also be solved by establishing new practices,” explains Marthe Zirngiebl from the sfs. “In order to develop, test, and disseminate ideas, the potential of the entire society is needed, and universities and their students can also play a decisive role.” For this reason, the “Smash the Box Challenge” was funded as an innovative teaching project by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research in the “Society of Innovations” program.

Coaching and workshops

Since October 2023, the student teams have been accompanied in their idea-finding process by Alexandra Schmidt from the CET and Marthe Zirngiebl from the sfs through workshops and coaching. In addition, they had to deal with representatives of the city, the catering trade, and start-ups that are already working on solutions for sustainable reusable logistics. During this time, the students learned to grasp the problem in its complexity, to develop and evaluate ideas, to work out business models – and finally to successfully present their solution approach. The final “pitch” was embedded in a larger workshop on reusable use, which the “Smash the Box” project team conducted out together with the responsible persons of the “DoZirkulär2030” project of the Office for Economic Development, which promotes ideas for the circular economy in Dortmund.

Information on the “Smash the Box” Challenge

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