Tidy Our Town: More than 35,000 purple bags filled by Northants Litter Wombles in the past 12 months

Group founder Nicola Elliott’s litter picking journey began a year before the ‘purple army’ was formed, when she set up her own village group where she lives in West Haddon.

The group used to pay particular attention to a layby in Crick and over the course of four weekends, they would typically collect 160 bags of litter.

The start of the Wombles stemmed from Nicola seeing a negative social media post about the amount of litter that remained after some flooding in January 2021.

As people expressed their disgust online, Nicola said she was happy to go along and clear it with her equipment – and asked if anyone else wanted to join.

After a lot of interest, it sparked the idea that people across the entire county may be interested in doing their bit. Now, Nicola is joined by thousands of volunteers helping to make a difference.

In the fifth and final Tidy Our Town story of this week, to mark a year since the campaign launch, Nicola shared the latest purple bag figures with the Chronicle & Echo.

The founder said that over the past 12 months, 35,474 bags of rubbish have been collected – which amounts to around 680 bags per week and just under 100 per day.

The total figure was 116,267 at the end of January 2025, which covers everything collected since the Northants Litter Wombles were formed.

“It’s amazing to think that people have put in so much hard work and effort to get to that figure,” said Nicola. “It’s also incredibly sad that there’s so much litter but we’re seeing improvements in areas.”

The Northants Litter Wombles now have just under 4,600 members and Nicola believes some newbies have been a direct result of this newspaper’s coverage – which she says is “fantastic”.

“It’s been a really good year and we’ve moved forward with the Deposit Return Scheme,” Nicola continued. “Picking up litter isn’t going to solve the problem, we have to think of imaginative ways rather than increasing the number of pickers.

“It’s always nice meeting new people and we warn those who have never done it that it can be slightly addictive. It helps you to find your tribe of like-minded people.

“It’s really encouraging that so many people find us and want to make a change to the environment. It’s not so much of an uphill struggle with the support of residents, businesses and the local authorities.”

As well as trialling a Deposit Return Scheme to see the town get ahead of the national curve, Nicola says she and her fellow volunteers would love to see changes to the bin collection system.

She said: “The town has no wheelie bins, and rubbish blows all over the place and looks awful. We want to get some local councillors on board.”

Though the monthly litter bag collection figures remain consistent throughout the year, interestingly there tends to be an increase at the start of the year as people make it their New Year’s Resolution – despite the cold weather.

When asked what message she would like to send about how easy it is to get involved with the Northants Litter Wombles, Nicola said: “I’d stress we’re a good bunch of people of all ages and backgrounds.

“Some people like to go out on their own and others love being involved in group picks. You find your tribe of like-minded people and it’s so flexible – you spend as much or as little time as you want.

“I’ve never regretted going out for a litter pick but I’ve regretted not going. It’s a really positive experience and you have an enormous sense of wellbeing knowing you’ve made an area look better.”

If you would like to get involved in the Tidy Our Town campaign, established in collaboration with the Northants Litter Wombles, email [email protected].

To get involved and find out more, you can join the Northants Litter Wombles Facebook page here.