Supermarket Sweep

While shopping at my local Tescos it dawned on me that the baskets would make great storage units for the bus. A chain of thought which set into motion an almighty chain of events.

I asked at the checkout if they could let me have some broken ones, and worked my way up the "food chain" til I got to the shift manager, who gave me the number of head office, who said they would look into it. And there I gave up on it, cos when someone on a helpline at head office says they will call you back, you know that's the end of it.

Less than a week later I got a voice mail from Tescos head office; they'd be delighted to give me two baskets. (- maybe one for each tonne of carbon?).

Armed with press cuttings I went to collect the baskets and managed to persuade the customer support manager that it was worth give me a few and out of the pile of 10 she had, she gave me half - so I am now the proud owner of 5 broken shopping baskets which will be cleaned and turned into draws.

Next Sainsburys, and Asda and...

There's a lesson in this about corporate recycling which is quite encouraging.

Tescos (and the others) are responsible for their baskets turning into waste, and as such are a bit scared to let any old Joe have them who might them rip them up (but for the Tesco logo on them) and leave them lying around the urban landscape. So they have a strict protocol and SLAs with contractors who dispose of their waste in a way which is no doubt the best way to do it (or the cheapest??). And unfortunately for me when curve ball idea comes along their strict protocol cannot compute.

5 down 15 to go.