Card-mageddon: over 1,900 posters swamp campus

Campaigns for Students’ Union sabbatical officer positions resulted in over 1,900 pieces of cardboard distributed around campus, the Boar can reveal.

The Boar asked each sabbatical officer candidate how many pieces of cardboard they used around campus. The survey did not take into account poster sizes and did not include posters of part-time officer candidates.

The candidates that distributed the highest number of posters were education officer candidate Jasmine Jones and democracy and development officer candidate Tom Diamond.

Postgraduate officer Andrew Thompson, deemed “the cardboard don of the week” by education officer-elect Charlie Hindhaugh, followed behind with over 160 pieces of circle posters.

The ‘average’ number of campaign posters for each candidate was 92.

I just hate cardboard now
Luke Pilot, welfare and campaigns officer-elect

Candidates with the lowest number of cardboard used included presidential candidate Stanley Dodd and democracy and development candidate Cayo Sobral.

Luke Pilot, next year’s welfare and campaigns officer, who used 90 pieces of cardboard, commented on the importance of cardboard in campaigning: “I massively underestimated the importance of cardboard, but at the same time it’s frustrating how cardboard, something completely unrelated to your potential ability as a sabbatical officer, is so important.

“I just hate cardboard now.”

Mr Hindhaugh recalled that his campaign “involved several trips with armfuls of cardboard to the back of Costcutter, many scoutings out at Tesco, and a trip to Ikea for the quality stuff”.

A typical sabb candidate’s room photo: Charlie Hindhaugh

However, there was no direct correlation found between the number of cardboard used and votes.

Three of next year’s elected officers used the lowest number of posters compared to their rivals. Mr Hindhaugh used 100 pieces of cardboard, democracy and development officer-elect Oliver Rice used 35 and postgraduate officer-elect Nat Panda used 65.

Elected societies officer George Creasy and sports officer Alex Roberts were also in the lower spectrum with 70 and 40 pieces of cardboard respectively.

Commenting on the amount of cardboard used, Mr Pilot said that most of his cardboard was recycled in the end.

Sam Parr, welfare and campaigns officer candidate, described how he tried to cut down on weight by using “corrugated cardboard… covered by sheet cardboard on one side”.

Andrew Thompson, who ran for re-election, explained how he “tried to be as efficient as possible”.

He said: “I always tried to…get at least two out of a box… I used the three biggest boxes I had to make my six massive circles.”