Boston Gal's Open Wallet

Local governments, corporations and small businesses around the country are increasingly partnering with mobile-shredding companies to host free get-togethers, some of which resemble homespun carnivals. In addition to recycling the paper, there’s often another cause attached, such as raising money for cancer research or crime prevention. But the chief appeal is a more visceral one: preventing identity theft.

In Katy, Texas, Janine Godwin, a 47-year-old professional organizer, has donated her time to coordinate six free “festive” mobile shredding events over the past three years in her area. To lure participants, they feature extras like decorations, clowns, face painting, dogs and cats available for adoption, information booths, cookies and refreshments. “Just shredding can be boring,” Ms. Godwin says.

Mobile shredders—essentially retooled box trucks containing industrial-size paper shredders—may be to adults with sensitive documents what ice-cream trucks are to children on a hot summer day.

At the Brielle event last month, which was sponsored by Monmouth County, N.J., locals compared their loads and—competing with the roaring sound of the truck—laughed when confessing to how long, where and why they’ve been collecting the items while they waited. Conga-line style, every few minutes the group would shuffle forward carrying, dragging and kicking documents closer to the truck.