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SvennoJ on 10 July 2020
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JRPGfan said:

Most of europe has this system.
In denmark its a 10/20 dkkr coin, you put it into the cart, and the locking mechanism unlocks it from the rest of the carts.
Then when you leave the shop, you yourself, take the cart back to the line, push it into the line, and lock it again (with the chain) and the coin drops back out.

Its a small incentive, to have people do the right thing, and its highly effective.
Its like this is the rest of europe too (just with say a euro coin).

You'll probably be shocked to hear that we dont have someone to pack our bought foods either, or carry them for us, to the cars.
Its expected you do that yourself. To me, it would be odd, if I suddenly found someone packing my bought items into a bag and offering to carry them out for me.

We have the same thing with bottles of vine, and soda cans.
"pant" is like this small extra cost put on these items, to encurage people to do the right thing. 
Instead of throwing them around, or into crash bins, you can return them at supermarkets, and get money back from returning them.

Why does this matter? well they can then recyle them, and as a upside we pollute abit less with such items.
(seriously broken bottles and soda cans, dont need to be laying around anywhere. Return them and recycle them.)

Its also becomeing more and more common, that you dont use a plastic bag when you go shopping.
You bring your own bag, thats a reuseable and durable type.

Im not sure if its like that in the USA is it? I have this idea from TV shows that tons and tons of plastic bags are used.

*edit:

About the fruit, I honestly dont reconise it.
However Im not surprised its from Aldi. 
Aldi sometimes do these things like "mexico week" and you ll find a section of the store dedicated to say "mexican food items" and fruits ect.
You might even find some recipes nearby that encurage you to try eating something mexican.


I think it's only a US thing to have a separate bagger / carry out to car service. I live in Canada and while stores like Walmart will put it into plastic bags for you at the register, it's not a separate person. The supermarket I go to only offers to sell you plastic bags if you don't bring your own bags and will only assist the elderly when needed. I rather pack it myself anyway, might as well pre sort it for faster putting away at home.

Only beer, wine and liquor bottles are recycled here at the stores (which are government licensed separate stores, only sold with ID) The rest goes in the blue bin and gets sorted out at the recycling center. Milk comes in sets of 3 x 1L plastic bags here that you put in a plastic container.

Still bad for the environment, the plastic goes in the regular garbage. When I lived in the Netherlands they had a barter system with durable clear plastic milk bottles that you brought back to the store for re-use. It looks like they went back to milk cartons and non re-use plastic bottles, can't find a picture.

I do prefer the recycling rules here. It was always a question what went where in the Netherlands. Here it's simply, everything with the recycling logo on the package goes in the blue bin, gets sorted out at the recycling center. But most still ends up in the landfill bleh. FACT: About 86 per cent of Canada's plastic waste ends up in landfill, while a meager nine per cent is recycled. The rest is burned to create energy, which causes emission problems, or the plastic enters the environment as litter.

Anyway plastic bags were on the outs before the pandemic hit. Then everyone panicked that bringing your own bags would spread the virus so stores started providing tons of plastic bags again. Luckily your own bags are allowed again currently, however the cupboard we had with plastic bags (to re-use as garbage bags in the bathroom) which was almost empty, now hardly closes again ugh. Set for another 10+ years of garbage liners lol.

Not only supermarkets started using tons of plastic again
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/28/coronavirus-plastic-waste-surges-as-restaurants-use-more-disposable-packaging.html

https://www.thestar.com/business/2020/06/22/the-other-pandemic-a-resurgence-in-single-use-plastic-and-plastic-waste-during-covid-19.html

The coronavirus has produced another sort of outbreak: a global resurgence in single-use plastic and a torrent of mostly unrecyclable personal protective equipment littering city streets, clogging sewage pipes, even turning up deep below the waves.

“This is only the beginning,” said a spokesperson for Opération Mer Propre (Operation Clean Sea), a French environmental NGO that collected nine surgical face masks and 14 latex gloves during a recent dive to the Mediterranean seabed around the resort town of Antibes. “If nothing changes, it will become a real ecological disaster if not a sanitary one,” the group said on Facebook where images of the debris were posted last month.

The plans to completely ban plastic bags at supermarkets in parts of the country have been abandoned for now.


JRPGfan said:

SvennoJ move to europe, and you can still use the "old ways" without getting funny looks.
Like why wouldn't you use the cart to take things to your own car? obviously if you buy alot, its sensible to do so (or if your older or weaker).


Why would you just leave the cart there next to the car? its selfish and bound to annouy the next person that goes shopping, and wants to park around there? Or do the expect someone at the shop to go around rounding up carts constantly? and makeing sure they arn't a danger? Honestly its not like people cant take 1 minuet to bring back a cart, every other day or so when they go shopping. The stealing of carts.... is that common? what the hell does the avg person want with a shopping cart? Like.... I dont see the point.

Seriously move to denmark :) We are like one of the biggest cycling nations in the world.
Its quite common in bigger cities, you dont even own a car, you just cycle where you need, or walk if not to far (or use public transportation).
Simply because parking is such a issue, its often faster on a bike. If you live outsides the cities, almost everyone cycles (atleast the kids to school and such).

I came from Europe, hence the funny looks and getting cursed out on the road for cycling like I'm going through traffic in Amsterdam :) Compared to The Netherlands it's still the wild west here when it comes to 'rules' for cycling on the road. It's a huge grey area and bicycle lanes are very inconsistent to nonexistent. (Plus traffic lights for cyclist, never seen them here. Construction, no detours posted for bicycles)

Everyone does use the carts to bring the stuff (in bags) to the car. Some people are just lazy and leave the cart on the parking lot. Then probably get just as mad when they run into an abandoned shopping cart with their car...

Stealing carts is not common here. Nearly everyone uses a car to do groceries after all. It was common in Amsterdam. Students and others taking the carts home, and you often saw carts that had ended up in ponds and canals.

Seems it's still a problem

https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=nl&u=https://www.abax.com/nl/blog/is-het-oke-om-winkelwagentjes-mee-naar-huis-te-nemen&prev=search&pto=aue
Supermarkets / hardware stores still lose five million euros annually because approximately 20 thousand shopping carts disappear each year. An average shopping cart costs around Euro 250, -

https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=nl&u=https://nos.nl/l/2298347&prev=search&pto=aue
It is a persistent phenomenon: shopping carts and baskets that disappear from the supermarket. Every year thousands of copies are 'borrowed' or actually just stolen. Much to the chagrin of supermarkets. It leads to millions of euros in extra expenses.


I do prefer living here, much more room, never any trouble parking and once you get away from the busy streets, perfect cycling. I can cycle for 80 to 120km here and hardly see anyone along the way. In the Netherlands it was constant stop and go, weave through tons of cyclist and pedestrians while dodging mopeds. Any slightly nice day and it was slow going, bicycle traffic jams... Here you can also leave your bike unlocked to pop in a store and never any trouble to find a spot to place it. I have a trailer which I used to take the kids cycling (they're too big now) but it's still fine to get pool supplies for example. 40kg of salt and 20L of chlorine, chemical load coming down hill lol.

No more of this!


This is my downtown nowadays :)

We actually didn't own a car until 2006. We lived in Brantford until then, across the street from a 24h supermarket. Then we got an electric hybrid and quickly found out that sucks in the cold winters here. Takes forever to warm up and is hardly more efficient in the cold. We drove it for 4 years and didn't really break even for the extra cost vs lower fuel consumption. The small trunk space (due to battery) was a pita as well. So when we got kids we switched to a SUV, 9 liters per 100 km. Much worse than the hybrid (which could do 4.5/100 in summer, but up to 7 or 8 in winter). Happy wife, lots of room to put plants in (gardener) We don't drive much, we'll stick to gas for now.

Having a garage helps the environment as well. A lot of people around here have remote starters and have their car idle for 10 minutes in winter to thaw out the car before they leave... Then you have lawnmower pollution. The EPA estimates that hour-for-hour, gasoline powered lawn mowers produce 11 times as much pollution as a new car. According to the EPA, each gas-powered lawn mower produces as much air pollution as 43 new automobiles driven 12,000 per year – lawn care produces 13 billion pounds of toxic pollutants per year.
The world needs better battery tech. The heavy batteries for edge trimmers hardly last 10 minutes, then 12 hours to charge again. Electric lawnmowers aren't popular either. Properties are so big you would need very long extension cords which you can run over or decapitate plants with :/ I used a push mower at our previous place, it sucked. Canadian weeds are too tough lol. Anyway no need to mow now due to the long heat and no rain. Grass is all yellow.

Last edited by SvennoJ - on 10 July 2020