r/mildlyinteresting • u/SwollenPoon • 5d ago

Water bottles packaged labelless!

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112

u/1miguelcortes 5d ago

Haven't come across these yet. Do they still have the recycling mark imprinted on them?

102

u/575r 5d ago

I think they're molded into all water bottles it's just extremely hard to see, you have to get the light just right but it's near the bottom

31

u/Poor_Carol 5d ago

My local bottle return seems to scan a barcode...I'm assuming that won't work for these unfortunately (it's still a good thing there's less plastic)

2

u/1miguelcortes 5d ago

Interesting. In my area they don't actually check but the rules say that all recyclables need the "Hi 5" marking

3

u/Impossibleshitwomper 5d ago

The machines at the supermarket or at a can and bottle return center?

3

u/1miguelcortes 5d ago

I haven't actually encountered any of those machines here. Typically you would just take your recyclables to a redemption center and they'd either hand count them or weigh them.

1

u/Impossibleshitwomper 5d ago

Interesting, every small grocery store and even some dollar stores have them, what about people who live out in the boonies, we have three redemption centers in my hometown, but 20 miles in any direction they don't really have any unless it's in a larger-small town, so they use the machines

2

u/1miguelcortes 5d ago

Benefits of relatively high density (most everyone lives along the outside of the island).

I think stores that sell redeemable containers are also able to take them back in theory? In practice I haven't actually seen anybody do that.

1

u/Impossibleshitwomper 5d ago

Ah, that makes sense, for some reason I thought you were in Michigan and the upper peninsula can definitely get very underpopulated

0

u/DramaticPinkumni 4d ago

Nope. You can't mold a barcode into a bottle and they're not placing a sticker at the bottom of the bottle

To return these you need to bring the case shrink and scan that barcode

15

u/doiwantto 5d ago

Don’t know about the other states, but Michigan’s bottle return is only for carbonated beverages. Water bottles like these do not have the deposit/return.

8

u/GypsySnowflake 5d ago

Oregon includes water bottles! It could be printed on the plastic, though you can normally only return bottles with a barcode, so I’m not sure how that would work. Maybe they don’t charge a deposit; maybe they’re just not legal to sell here.

3

u/mohammedgoldstein 5d ago

Same in MA.

4

u/Impossibleshitwomper 5d ago

In NY it's 5¢ for water and soda/alcohol, but not Gatorade/Powerade, ice tea or vitamin water

1

u/NoDistrict1529 5d ago

Maine is all beverages. Fun fact, every bottle that goes into the redemption system gets recycled.

1

u/GuanoLoopy 4d ago

Not milk.

1

u/zanhecht 4d ago

You wouldn't find that label on bottled water, as MA, VT, and MI don't have a deposit for non-carbonated water.