Free groceries?!?

[Oaktree]

My Dad who is a millionaire (Not that that means much today) goes around his neighborhood picking beer botles out of peoples garbage.

I'm no millionaire, but I do go for what I call "can walks", picking up cans on the side of the road. We don't have a deposit law here, but all our neighboring states do so there are plenty of nickel back cans/bottles. I take the deposit ones across the river and cash them in, the others get crushed and taken to the metal recycler once a year. I've been known to fish cans out of the trash barrels at gas stations, etc.
The money goes in a kitty that we use for vacations, eating out, etc.

Back in the 80s when I first started doing this I noticed that over 50% of the cans on the roadside were Budweiser or other Anheiser-Busch brands. Bought some AB stock based on that observation. It did quite well for me.

 

[newbury]

Back in the late '60's for a few years I had a spring ritual in northern Vermont. First good weather weekend after ice-out, usually about early May if I remember correctly, my buddy and I would go on about a 10 mile bike ride "loop" picking up bottles and cans that had a deposit. We would each carry a grain sack and usually fill them up, mostly with discarded beer bottles. Good afternoons were had.

 

[Industrial Toys]

A can I pickd up last summer had apparently been used by a chewer. Emptied it's contents in the back of my Gator. I hate touching other peoples garbage!

 

[jmc]

Sorry, OP but since we're off topic...

I live on a former Indiana state highway that now serves as a glorified county road. Back when, it was part of the Dixie Highway system which were major N-S highways before the interstate system. My grandparents probably took it to Florida every winter from Ft Wayne.

Neighbor decides he wants to pick up the litter along it- about a century's worth, after rust. Old bottles and the vintage beer cans that predated pull tabs - the ones you needed a beer can opener to poke triangular holes. He bagged them and I helped him carry the bags to his car.

Woke up in the middle of that night, still half asleep, but could feel something lightly crawling on my stomach. Found a 3 inch millipede in bed with me. Groggy and creeped out, had a passing thought that maybe it had eaten its way out of my abdomen! Checked myself for holes... Probably fell out of one of those cans that had been a millipede condo for decades.

 

[Fuddy1952]

But that doesn't explain how much she knew to have charged to her card until your order had been totaled up.


But I don't really need to know .... just wondering.

Apparently she didn't care. She must of said to clerk add his stuff to mine.
The clerk then pulled off a long receipt throwing it in trash.
The girl wouldn't have known total, which didn't matter.

 

[Fuddy1952]

Speaking of cans. I just realized wife and I throw out lots of aluminum cans. I just called local recyclers and they pay 24 cents/pound.
I weighed a can, 0.7oz.
I did the math and works out to be a penny a can. Bottom line for me it's not worth my time/fuel to go to recycler. Even at 6 cans/day...that's about $1.80/month!!!!!

 

[fried1765]

Apparently she didn't care. She must of said to clerk add his stuff to mine.
The clerk then pulled off a long receipt throwing it in trash.
The girl wouldn't have known total, which didn't matter.

That is the way it is done!

 

[Wagtail]

My buddy says it's called pay forward.

It's a 'gesture' thing.

I 'somewhat' do it whenever I'm in Launceston at my favourite clothing shop, called "Rivers". On their receipt they give a 10% discount for your next purchase (3 month expiry) and, since I infrequently travel into "Launie", I simply hand the docket with the discount to either the next person in the queue or tell the salesperson to apply it to the next customer.

 

[Jstpssng]

Back in the late '60's for a few years I had a spring ritual in northern Vermont. First good weather weekend after ice-out, usually about early May if I remember correctly, my buddy and I would go on about a 10 mile bike ride "loop" picking up bottles and cans that had a deposit. We would each carry a grain sack and usually fill them up, mostly with discarded beer bottles. Good afternoons were had.

I've seen people do that in springtime up here. They will leave Lincoln ME and head north on the road everybody took all winter to go ice fishing, and by the time they get to my town 45 miles away they have an entire carload of empties. I often wonder wht else they find along their route... most of my best tow chains came off the side of that same stretch of road. I also lost a brand new Craftsman ratchet on the same stretch of road, the first time that I used it...

 

[Industrial Toys]

I recycle every bit of metal I can. Not for the money, or do I even get any. Just my way of trying to make ammends for destroying the planet in my time here.

 

[Oaktree]

I recycle every bit of metal I can. Not for the money, or do I even get any. Just my way of trying to make ammends for destroying the planet in my time here.

I don't know how much of the planet I've "destroyed" in my lifetime, I just can't see something being thrown away that can be re-used. More Yankee thrift than anything else.

 

[LD48750]

I love it when I read or hear on the TV News about a recycling center trucking their stuff off to a dump because they can't sell it or give it away.

 

[Jstpssng]

I love it when I read or hear on the TV News about a recycling center trucking their stuff off to a dump because they can't sell it or give it away.

Our transfer station no longer accepts most recycleables because they can't get rid of them.

 

[Frankenkubota]

I love it when I read or hear on the TV News about a recycling center trucking their stuff off to a dump because they can't sell it or give it away.

And the only solution is to put significant deposits on any and all containers.

My neighbor almost shot me when I suggested that.

I delivered 7up in the early 70s, glass bottles. The worst part of the job was the empties. I had to sort them and then stack them in the truck bays, thousands every day.

The real fun was. you took a case of empty quarts, all glass, and you would literally throw them up on top of your truck. It was maybe 10 ft above the pavement? The really good guys could not only get them to land without spilling but they could get them to line up on top. I climbed to the top of that truck 1000 times.

To this day I can not imagine driving down the road at 60 MPH with 400 empty glass bottles up there just a rockin and a rollin.

Empties were a MAJOR PITA so, big deposits probably not in our future. I'm not worried though because, I'm pretty sure, as far as recycling goes, everyone will do the right thing.

 

[2LaneCruzer]

We have a local recycling service, and having spent my career in environmental regulation, I recycle everything religiously. They don't take glass any more (unfortunately), but do take most metal and plastic. Funny thing; I had been saving pull tabs from aluminum cans for twenty years or so, including those from family reunions, cook outs, other gatherings and third party contributions. I recently sent them to McDonald's House; must had 15 gallons or so. No, they weren't all from beer, and no, I didn't drink it all. :licking:

 

[Jstpssng]

We have a local recycling service, and having spent my career in environmental regulation, I recycle everything religiously. They don't take glass any more (unfortunately), but do take most metal and plastic. Funny thing; I had been saving pull tabs from aluminum cans for twenty years or so, including those from family reunions, cook outs, other gatherings and third party contributions. I recently sent them to McDonald's House; must had 15 gallons or so. No, they weren't all from beer, and no, I didn't drink it all. :licking:

Are they actually able to sell those tabs? I did a search once and read that saving them for charity is just another urban legend.

A lot of places here have ongoing bottle drives for various reasons; usually just a trailer parked someplace where you can bring your returnables. Recycling is a thing of the past except for metal, the transfer station stopped collecting and moved the trailers away. There has to be a market for the plastic and cardboard which apparently doesn't exist.

 

[LD48750]

Are they actually able to sell those tabs? I did a search once and read that saving them for charity is just another urban legend.

A lot of places here have ongoing bottle drives for various reasons; usually just a trailer parked someplace where you can bring your returnables. Recycling is a thing of the past except for metal, the transfer station stopped collecting and moved the trailers away. There has to be a market for the plastic and cardboard which apparently doesn't exist.

Judging from the price of scrap around here, there isn't much market for metal either.
Recycling is mostly a feel good thing .

 

[2LaneCruzer]

Are they actually able to sell those tabs? I did a search once and read that saving them for charity is just another urban legend.

A lot of places here have ongoing bottle drives for various reasons; usually just a trailer parked someplace where you can bring your returnables. Recycling is a thing of the past except for metal, the transfer station stopped collecting and moved the trailers away. There has to be a market for the plastic and cardboard which apparently doesn't exist.

Yeah, they are pure aluminum, and they get standard scrap prices for them. As long as they are donated in quantity, there is no processing, cleaning, crushing, etc, they just send them to the scrap dealer. Being small items, they will fit in almost any container you like; I think they took mine and put them in industrial grade plastic trash bags.

Pop Tabs Donations | Ronald McDonald House Charities