Re: [greenyes] ECR

[OrionCA <orionca@no.address>]

On Mon, 28 Jun 2004 12:23:59 -0400, you wrote:

>
>Michelle Raymond wrote:
>What a concept!
>
>Can you really blame a beverage maker when someone casually tosses the 
>container on the ground at a park or beach??
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>
>Well, maybe at least in part.   Beverage makers changed the packaged beverage paradigm from one of shared responsiblity in which a consumer was incentivized by an industry-operated deposit on each container to one where the consumer and government were to take total responsibility....by proudly introducing the "One-Way" can, and later bottle.   
>
>I'm old enough to have seen the "No Depost, No Return" transition, and it was definately pushed as a "convenience" for consumers, eventhough they had for decades been returning bottles to retailers when they purchased more beverage.   The strong "anti-social" marketing message was it was OK to casually throw your container on the ground or at a park..

Grocers hated taking back the dirty empties; they had to make room for
them, they had to keep track of them and this cost them more than the
bottles were worth. Now that there are "collection stations" it's not
that big a deal for them so they're happy to collect the deposit on
bottles and cans.  I suspect they hold the deposit funds in an
interest-bearing account before turning it over to the state, for one
thing.

>.I remember a magazine ad which showed 2 men fishing, and casting their empties into the river, as the new disposable cans were being touted.

I don't remember that ad but I believe it.  

>
>Now, of course, slobs threw refillables about in the 1920's, but I can testify from personal experience that there was keen competition in my neighborhood for the containers with industry deposits of 2cents on beer and three cents on glass pop [soda to you easterners] bottles in the 1960's.   My success at recovering them certainly allowed me to complete my baseball card collections each summer  [and consume more pop than my parents would buy]!

Heh.  When I was 11 I got in trouble at a local private college for
"stealing" bottles  left out on the grounds or dropped in trash cans
by the students.  They actually called a police officer to haul me
off.  The cop took the bag of bottles "as evidence" and dropped me and
my ill-gotten loot off at a supermarket a couple of blocks from home.
Told me I might want to change hunting grounds.  >:)

>You CAN make beverage makers [and other product manufacturers] responsible for the choices they make in product and packaging materials, [as well as their marketing practices] and to provide/support a system for reuse/recovery of these materials...

The ideal container is of course glass because even if it's improperly
disposed of, an ice age or two down the road it turns back into sand.
It's a little heavy and fragile for beverage makers' taste, however.
Right now I'm sipping clear sparkling water, cherry-flavored, from a
plastic bottle and it's going straight to the recycling box by my desk
in about four swallows.   Aluminum is 100% recyclable but you have to
convince people it's worth their while to recycle - side note:  I seem
to recall that back when California imposed its deposit law in the
mid-80s some activists were upset because they thought it "demeaning"
that poor people would be encouraged scavenge cans and bottles along
the road.  I noticed that right after the law went into effect the
roads were a whole heck of a lot cleaner so maybe the poor didn't feel
so demeaned.
--
I'm on a journey in search of myself.
If I get back first, let me know that I'm 
looking for myself and don't let me leave.