Coke Knew Their Plastic Would Trash the Planet…And Did It Anyway

[@lawyer1165]

As kids in the 1950s, my friends and I would gather all the empty glass bottles we could find in our garages, haul them to a local supermarket, and collect 2 cents for small bottles and 5 cents for large bottles. That effort provided spending money for candy and toys.

[@tukicat1399]

In south Australia we have a bottle refund on ALL plastic drink bottles, kids pizza money!!

[@Saje3D]

And by the early seventies when I was a kid public spaces were strewn with broken glass from all the people who didn’t bother, or in places where they didn’t bother with bottle deposits.

[@tukicat1399]

@@Saje3D so we never try to change? thats a particularly backward and stupid attitude.

[@jabbermocky4520]

We did that as kids in the 60s, too. The conversion to plastic bottles was a terrible idea, in retrospect.

[@purplemicrodot58]

Yup, in the 70's I'd walk old dirt roads and creek beds to pick up filthy, muddy bottles, wash them and return them to the old country store for a nickel each.

[@godzillamothra5983]

I still remember my childhood in the 80s. My mom went to the market carrying her own basket, there were hardly any plastic bags. Sellers wrapped their goods in papers or banana leaves. I also remember the sodas came in glass bottles or tin can only. I still remember when the plastic bottle came out first. I thought "hmm, this tasted weird". Now it become a normal thing. Scary how plastic took over our world so fast.

[@Epic_C]

Same, I bake vaguely remember glass bottle exchanges in the 80s. By the time I was in high school in the 90s it was all plastic. I have stuck with aluminum cans since they don't sell them in glass bottles for the most part. I don't buy them ever in plastic.

[@SofaKingShit]

Where l live in rural Africa there's plastic everywhere in the fields together with the smell of burning plastic.

[@markd.9042]

This is the thing I really love about those times. They weren't the cleanest environmentally but consumption was more mindful.

[@prabhatsourya3883]

This brings back fond memories of the small glass bottles, which were supposed to be drunk on the spot and returned to the shopkeeper. Even the taste from the coke in the glass bottles was kind of better than that of the plastic bottles.

[@ivar-the-terrible]

Plastic is full of poisons and pfas so makes sense for the bad taste

[@Epic_C]

That is a combination of they simply are better in glass, plus the fact it was real sugar and not HFCS like it is now.

[@johnnyxmusic]

Plus, the serving size was much smaller.

[@binaryflat]

I'm in my 60s , and when I was child, even a teen, Cokes were 10 cents for a 7 ounce bottle. Glass feels better, is colder, and drinks seem to taste better. I used to open the door on the machine, and PULL the Coke out. It was so low tech, but cool!

[@jimdennis2451]

@Epic_C Mexican Coke, with the sugar and the ice cold glass bottles, instantly takes me back to sitting on my grandparents front porch when I was a kid.

[@BC-tp8ep]

Economics 101 says spillover costs should be eliminated. This means coke shouldn’t make money while pushing the cost of their pollution onto the rest of the planet.

[@rheunaetoole7830]

But people keep drinking it

[@galactick3816]

@@rheunaetoole7830 that's not an issue, the issue is that they aren't forced to pay to deal with their pollution.

[@UmbertoAmante]

F Coca-Cola Corp and their woke leftist agenda. I say make them pay and leave the good people of the U.S. alone to enjoy life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

[@DarrylSmith1968]

@galactick3816 ​ Coke is NOT tossing their bottles the PEOPLE that drink it are the ones tossing them

[@lil_weasel219]

economics 101 doesnt account for the fact that the real world doesnt operate according to classical liberal fairy tales

[@techcafe0]

To this day, less than 5% of plastic is actually 'recycled' in the United States (Canada is not much better at about 9%); with at least 85% of plastic waste dumped into landfills. so recycling plastic bottles seems to have been a tragic farce, concocted by Coca-Cola, et al, right from the very beginning.

[@DarrylSmith1968]

Yes because Coke sends people to your house takes the used bottles and tosses them on the street. Guess it's easier to blame Coke then the lazy people.

[@michaelfoxbrass]

@techcafe0 I agree. And even more so, recycling plastic is extremely inefficient, and petrochemical companies knew this when public concerns were raised about the explosive growth in trash generated by their use. Both petrochemical and consumer product companies contributed to pointing to the farcical solution of public recycling programs as the answer to their wanton search for profits by lowering their packaging costs, and being able to sell larger quantities of material in plastic containers.

[@michaelfoxbrass]

@@DarrylSmith1968a major reason so little plastic is recycled is that it’s inefficient to do so. Even where consumers participate at high levels, very little plastic is converted into a form suitable for second-use.

[@jamisonmunn9215]

Recycling was always doomed to fail. Glass bottles were the way to go and the best thing is no petrochemicals needed so while I am against using gasoline I feel like using oil for fuel right now is a necessary evil while the plastic bottle is just plain stupid. Just imagine how much lower gas prices would be if not much else was made with petrochemicals?

[@Schnittertm1]

And then we have Germany where, even though it still is to be improved, about 48% - 60% are recycled and reused to make new plastic bottles. The rest, since it is made from oil, is burned to produce power and heat homes. Besides that, we have both glass and plastic bottles that are reuseable. There is also a way to set up a system of recycling if there is a will for it and a system to make sure that a lot of people will suddenly return plastic bottles, instead of throwing them away carelessly. The solution for the latter is a deposit system, like the one we have in Germany. Each plastic bottle for one time use has a deposit of 0,25 € on it, so collecting bottles that have been thrown away can be a thing. Reuseable bottles (no matter if glass or plastic) and the trays they come in also have depoits. 0,08-0,15 € for the bottles and 1,50 € for the trays. It serves us well here.

[@jeffbisscrx]

The problem is that the federal government failed to mandate that unless the chemical industry develop real recycling processes, it foisted the responsibility on the consumer when there are ZERO real recycling processes, such as cold-plasma pyrolysis that actually breaks the plastic down into its constituent molecules, available. Current recycling rates are less than 8% for plastics. That said, it is pathetic that more people don't push back through their votes and instead vote for libertarians and conservatives who just don't care about functional ecosystems. The economy is not real, it's the creation of human desire, the environment is. The economy can be changed on a whim, the environment can't be. Greed is not good and selfishness is not a virtue.

[@notashroom]

Amen.

[@vivayo4588]

This!

[@classicdesignfinds]

Which democrats have done anything truly impactful toward this issue?

[@jeffbisscrx]

@classicdesignfinds That's a disingenuous question. The Democrats have a far better environmental record than the GOP, but because Americans in general don't give a damn, there's not as much pressure from regular voters to override the big money donors of the GOP who obstruct everything that their donors don't want. Look at the polling to see that Americans really don't value the environment, at those who answer polls.

[@stephanbrunker]

If you force the industry to do something, it simply works. In Germany, we have a set quota of how much beverages have to be sold in reusable containers over the whole market. So the market is split along this line between one-way and reusable containers. And because the balance was tipping to the one-way stuff, they enforced a deposit to these too. One of the effects is that cans have almost completely vanished. How good this system works and how stupid people are I can see on the overland routes in my area, the border region to Luxembourg, where such a system doesn't exist and gas and cigarettes are also a lot cheaper. For 15 kilometers from the border inwards, the roadsides are littered with trash - cigarette packaging and bottles. The density just drops from two every meter to one. The guys drive over the border, buy gas, cigarettes and beer and throw everything out the window on the return trip. Disgusting.

[@colinsmith2005]

Hitler, Hitler, Hitler, Hitler, drank Fanta.

[@InsoIence]

I will never forget my first trip to Sweden from our backwards Poland in 2006. Out in Malmö with my Swedish friend, I'm mindlessly picking at the label of my coke bottle, dismantling it. My friend stopped me as soon as he saw it and said that it's a dick move, because it makes the bottle worthless. Homeless people would go into the bins and exchange them at the machine in the supermarket. I had no clue. When we went to the shop, to exchange his home bottle stash, I was mind blown. In contrast, Poland only introduced mandatory sorting of your recycling and putting it in right containers (we used to have only 3 big, bell shaped containers for paper, glass and cans/plastics - voluntary; now there's more sorting tiers) at the start of 2020. Just as a side note, I obviously don't think collecting bottles is a solution to homelessness.

[@DonSawchuk]

This is startling! Let's get back to reusable bottles with deposits---been working for the beer stores in Ontario, Canada for decades.

[@GregEva]

Single use bottles are not allowed in Germany. They took the other path after the war. Here in France reusable bottles were banned in the name of “sanitation” - aka building the plastics industry of tomorrow.

[@slrochford2]

and now the beer manufacturers have gotten together and have stopped selling beer in refillable glass bottles. In Quebec, within the last couple of months, all you can find is beer in cans. Terrible.

[@ryuuguu01]

I remember when the brown stubby died. American beer companies complained it was an unfair trade barrier to have to use a standard bottle and we caved in.

[@ginabisaillon2894]

The saddest scene I have ever seen, and I saw it repeated over and over over the course of 20 years, is a Mexican family sitting around the table with a huge bottle of Coke in the middle of it. The second saddest scene was seeing the Coke and Pepsi trucks are delivering the poison to the most remote villages that you can imagine. Nobody else went there but Coke and Pepsi and Bimbo bread.

[@laviniam.1526]

Are these scenes from Coke tv advertisements?

[@ginabisaillon2894]

@@laviniam.1526 the family scene, yes. And there's another shocking one that I didn't mention- a TV advertisement, I mean, and that is a female athlete drinking directly from a huge bottle of Coke. Or maybe it was Pepsi. Same difference.

[@luminousfractal420]

And then Afghanistan. That was coke who started that war. The locals didn't want it as it went against their beliefs. So the USA decided to open up some McDonald's too. Taliban was formed due to this. Coke=.gov friends

[@boumbo45]

Whoa, if this is the saddest thing you've seen, your life must be so dull

[@InsoIence]

Meh, from what I hear, they are actively in Brazilian schools. Doing their promotions, encouraging schools to participate in their contests for who can collect the most coke caps for a measily prize, handing bottles out for free. I remember when some big companies used to do it in Poland as well, can't recall which though.

[@gzoechi]

The oil industry pushed hard to get plastic everywhere. They made easy money and learned how to spend it effectively.

[@bonniewills2814]

The commercial starring Iron Eyes Cody DEEPLY influenced my life! That single tear had a profound effect on me. My car was a rolling trash can because I wouldn't, couldn't litter. I'm 57 years old and I still feel the effect of that single tear.

[@MrSpherical]

excellent work everyone

[@tombloom99]

I'm old enough to remember 5 cent coke bottles. Now I live in Thailand where littering is common. I ride a bicycle and pick up that trash. It's not just coke, but tea and other plastic soft drink bottles scattered across the earth. When I biked in Europe in the 1970's, every liquid was sold in identical 1 litre glass bottles that were infinitely reused. On my next trip only 10 years later those bottles were gone. What happened?

[@damonroberts7372]

Milk used to be in glass bottles instead of plastic, as well. This is a lot bigger than the Coca-Cola company. A few of the issues that influenced the beverage industry's transition away from glass to "disposables" were problems of contamination and sanitization, breakage, and transport costs (not forgetting that the extra mass comes with its own carbon footprint). The thing is, the technology of the present day is very different from the 1970s, it is now _not unrealistic_ to have automated bottle sorting that rejects damaged units. There are also coatings that can reduce the propagation of fractures across glass, resulting in a much more durable bottle. It's definitely time to lay the groundwork for a return to glass.

[@ryuuguu01]

The study quoted in the video says that even in the 1970s it was better for society to use glass. It was only better for companies to use plastic because it allowed them to move much of the cost for packaging onto the public.

[@mk-apache6161]

This is what we need to be talking about. Corporations need to be held accountable.

[@SnarkyRC]

That'll never happen. Corporations have their claws in everything especially politics and the government.

[@kronos0316]

Accountable for what humans are dirty, i do over landing and anywhere people go they leave garbage all over the place.

[@digitalperson108]

Simply don’t drink that poison or any other processed sugar garbage drink in plastic bottles. The corps will wake up. But then, people as a whole are addicted to sugar and those drinks, and love convenience.

[@phaedrussmith1949]

Corporations are just words on paper. Corporations don't do these things, people do.

[@digitalperson108]

@@phaedrussmith1949 corporations are groups of people acting to produce revenue.

[@aoilpe]

This is an extreme example for PRIVATIZED PROFIT AND SOCIALIZED COSTS. I don’t buy Coke or Pepsi anymore… The “good old times” when empty bottles have provided some “pocket money” are long gone !

[@markpetz9593]

Mor e of this kind of story - very watchable and totally relatable. I do see also that there is a suggestion to lobby for deposits back again (like those 10 states and like we have in Finland) but no details how to do that...

[@ArcDragoon]

When the counter to plastics were to recycle, when the already existing answer to glass was to recycle. The only difference was who was accountable. When the cost is tossed at the consumer, we always all pay for it.

[@enigma1863]

This model has infected everything. I worked for a company that would replace store shelves and counters and they would throw away brand new shelves still in the box because they stopped storing them. It was cheaper to throw them out than to rent a warehouse hire people to manage that warehouse.

[@JKVisFX]

Great report told very well. This is a piece of history I had no idea about. Thank you for telling it.

[@dcptiv]

We have return & earn here in Australia. You get 10c per can, glass/plastic bottle. It's just a machine you put them into & it spits out a docket that you take to the supermarket to either cash in or buy stuff. I generally get around $30 once a month from plastic water bottles.

[@purplemicrodot58]

I'd be all over that.

[@ledsalesoz]

Return and Earn is the NSW scheme, not Australia's. A few of the states have their own schemes, like SA's scheme running since the 70s, but several states are yet to implement schemes despite promises they would be running by now.

[@HotNoob]

with today's technology, you could easily have a vending machine that cleans and rebottles glass bottles without having to go back to a bottling plant. that would be profitable and enviornmental.

[@peterbathum2775]

all recycling must be the legal and financial responsibility of manufacturers

[@cgimovieman]

I agree with this wholeheartedly. I grew up throughout the 80’s and 90’s, when plastics had pretty much all but replaced most glass bottles in soft drinks. It was in Michigan, and to this day the state is one of only two that have a 10¢ deposit on bottles. It not only was a completely ubiquitous practice amongst Michiganders to save our bottles and return them, but I used to ride my bike around as a kid collecting them off the street to turn in to make money off the deposits. So it also cleaned up the streets. We even had one adult guy in our town named Tommy, who didn’t have a job, and rode a big tricycle with baskets on it all around every day collecting cans and bottles. He lived off of just doing that. Everyone knew him too, and would leave cans and bottles for him. I do remember when soft drink companies had heavier plastic in their bottles, as well as extra colored bases that looked like bowls on the bottom of the bottle for stability. So some excess plastic has gone away. But it’s still an enormous problem. It can be hard to weigh though. Yes, plastic is bad. But putting things in glass instead means more weight, which equates to the vehicles shipping it using more fuel to transport it, which in turn may have just as much environmental impact. Or in a similar way, using all electric instead of gasoline can mean we consume more electricity, and an many cases the root of that electricity comes from coal power plants. But I still think reusing things, recycling, using electric, etc is the way to go. Every day I use reusable grocery bags at the grocery store. But holy crap do I never ever see anyone else doing this. In fact I see people put single products in single plastic bags, absolutely loading up on several dozen each trip. Even when the store I go to has signs everywhere reminding people to bring reusable bags, sells them for just 99¢, gives them out for free occasionally, and also occasionally has a person at a table at the entrance encouraging people with reusable bags. In many big cities and especially in Europe, you are charged about 5¢ for each plastic bag you take. And some stores don’t even have them. Just like bottle deposits, it really works and people bring their own bags. I’ve written my local stores encouraging them to do this, but none have. I’m told that they make other efforts and that it would anger their customers by charging for bags. It’s very frustrating, and one of those things in the U.S. that makes me feel like just moving at times.

[@fcscouto]

Michigan is not 1 of 2 states that have a 10c deposit..... California and Oregon have 10c also, Maine and Vermont have a 15c deposit. 5 states also have a 5c deposit

[@MichaelMarquez-m3b]

I remember as a kid in the 70s my parents routinely taking back a case of empty Coca Cola bottles when they went back to the store the following week to buy groceries again. Although the one thing I do remember thinking back then when they made the switch to plastic was the advantage that the plastic bottles had that they didn’t break when you dropped them. I remember once my elderly grandmother dropping a glass Coca Cola bottle and having to be taken to the hospital because of lacerations.

[@LM-fg7vi]

I was born in 1955. I think plastic is horrible stuff. That said, I also remember the broken glass everywhere, even though there was a 2 cent deposit. (Ten bottles and you had enough money to buy a gallon of that wonderful 19.9 cent per gallon gas we had!) I wish I had the answer, but part of the problem is we have lots of hateful angry people that will not go along with ANYTHING . They would be smashing the bottles again, and I got cut by that stuff. Maybe the aluminum idea might work, at least it stays in one piece for the most part. And it is highly recyclable.

[@LM-fg7vi]

Now that I think about it, if the deposit was 1/10th the price of a gallon of gasoline NOW, people lose their minds!!!!!

[@damonroberts7372]

They broke them, but also did things like put cigarette butts and other gross stuff inside, which at scale make them unrecoverable for beverage companies.

[@afrozkhan2588]

Research, direction, and music are the master pieces of this documentary. 💌

[@miriammcgee]

Don't buy soda. Or any other coke products. Just don't. Nothing they sell is good for you.

[@AnthonyMorris-pg9xj]

Or bottled water, juice, coffee or tea.

[@Svid1701D]

Dr Pepper is good for you, literally has "Dr" in the name

[@Svid1701D]

​@@AnthonyMorris-pg9xj easy to say, my municipal water is disgusting, a lot of people do not have access to clean water

[@AnthonyMorris-pg9xj]

@@Svid1701D true, there are some bad water areas. If you can invest in a water filter, do so.

[@bufordhighwater9872]

​@@Svid1701D If taste is your only concern, and you're sure that your plumbing isn't the cause, get a water filtration system. In most cases, municipal tap water isn't just more regulated, but it's inspected and maintained to a higher standard. Also in many places, bottled water is literally just tap water from wherever it bottled. As far as not having access to clean or running water, especially if it's not a temporary issue do to a disaster, weather, system failure, etc, bottled water isn't an economical option.

[@wideawake5630]

I occasionally buy a Coke to strip rust off of metal or clean oil off the driveway. It should never be ingested.

[@homeagain9692]

Came from Canada 25 years ago and one of the things I noticed was the amount of beer bottles (of all things) that ended up in the trash. Hundreds of pounds over the course of one night from this one little local bar. Mind you at the same time it was just about $50 a case at that time in the late 90s in Ontario. Taxed to death.

[@f.remplakowski]

When I was a kid the most common sight on beaches were the remnants of eroded glass bottles in the surf (that would eventually become inert grains) and on the beach and cigarette butts. You would see the odd plastic bottle, I went back a few years ago and it’s plastic everywhere. Ideally we should switch back to glass with a deposit system but if that is too much to ask for these companies should be reclaiming their packaging at the site of municipal waste collection and recycling it themselves. Same with e-waste, they all make it difficult by asking people to bring their products in but they should be collecting it at waste disposal.

[@InsoIence]

They should be actively working with the government and citizens. But of course no, corruption is too tasty. The governments are too busy drinking shots out of corporations' belly buttons.

[@luigi55125]

And people collected the "sea glass", because it looked nice. Nobody wants the plastic lol

[@microsoft790]

I think it’s odd that in poor countries/locations coke still uses and owns the glass bottles and if they aren’t returned to them the vendor is charged for the bottles.

[@SDWNJ]

I was in northern Mexico on 1987 and they had bottle reception then. You could either pay for just the coke or for the coke and the bottle. To only pay for the coke you had to either bring an empty bottle with you or drink the coke right there and leave the empty bottle. I think it was around 8 pesos for the coke and 16 for the coke & bottle.

[@bluwasabi7635]

Did you catch that that study mentioned that aluminum was an ideal recyclable packaging?

[@Desperado070]

7 years ago I decided to let all soft drinks go, not for the things you think. Mainly for the plastic bottles, I'm done with poisoning myself. Ever since I've been searching for the glass bottles we used to have. Even the small glass bottles are unable to being bought by normal people like us. Only if you have a cafeteria or a cafe you can buy them. It is mind blowing how we are unable to buy a simple drink in a glass bottle. How we had it all but choose to destroy it all, kinda interesting point and that all for money. Plastic and metal bottles both use poison to line the insides. It prevents rust or the drink eating away at the plastic.

[@ToIsleOfView]

THIS IS EXACLY WHY WE MUST ROLL BACK LAWS FAVORING CORPORATIONS.

[@jamisonmunn9215]

Our companies and society as whole has thought about what they could do, especially when it comes to making money, but never stopped to think if they should. We as a society should be punishing all the companies who are filling our world with trash.

[@embassyembassy8319]

The most effective method is to stop consuming Coca Cola, Pepsi etc.

[@pedromain]

There's no way out. Single use plastic must be banned.

[@melviasheppard8466]

Please recycle if you do use those products.

[@minealsomine9663]

You are an idiot, if you, for one second, think you can recycle a chemical compound like plastic. There is no way to break the chemical bonds back to their original independent chemical compounds. Recycling of plastics is and was the greatest con ever pulled on us

[@PeterSedesse]

It is weird, because in central america, they have 2 liter returnable bottles, it works very well. There is a deposit, so you just keep trading them in for a full one.

[@luminousfractal420]

And this is why we need to tag plastics on a chemical level. As their collected and recycled the costs should be handed to the producers. You take a truckload of recyclables or trash, collect the tags and arrange them by amount, costs split amongst the abusers. Make it a cleanup tax. Maybe theyd think twice before allowing plastics through our eco systems and into the oceans. As soon as its more cost effective to be green they will adopt it in a heartbeat.

[@Freesavh1776]

Getting a 6 pack of coke in refillable glass bottles when I was a kid is 1 of my greatest memory. My mom, brother,& I would get them every Friday afternoon with salted peanuts. Put the peanuts in the drink. Oh that was so good.

[@Notinmylifetime]

And we get the blame and taxed out the arse for these damn companies doing the wrong thing in the first place.

[@Sacrypheyes]

i live in a place where they luckily still sell coke in reusable 1L glass bottles, but i wish it was generalized to most if not all beverages (they used to have glass bottles for all sodas back when i was a child). though they may not be available at all times, i try to buy coke in those glass bottles as often as possible; and i just stop buying it when they don't offer them. if anything, standardized, reusable containers should be made mandatory anywhere it can be relevant (which is almost always the case let's be honest).

[@willm5814]

Only solution to this problem is to cut it off at the source - we are spending billions in a futile effort to retrieve all of this plastic from the environment- now people are talking about using some strange organisms to eat the plastic- good God, that is true insanity!

[@MrSoulauctioneer]

being from a forward thinking state that enacted one of the earliest can deposit systems, I saw early on(one road trip out of state) the impact(or lack of) can deposits. Our roadsides were way cleaner than surrounding states. Moved to the east coast in the early 2000s and truly was appalled by the condition of the country east of Chicago. Twinkie and McDonald's wrappers don't have a deposit, but for some reason when Iowans stopped tossing cans and bottles out the window. the food wrappers stayed in the car as well. I did refer to it as a can deposit, but it covered all soft drink and alcohol containers with a few exceptions. 5 cents each, hasn't changed since the inception. 16 ounce glass bottles were an exception at 10 cents deposit.

[@SJmystic]

I distinctly remember the commercial with the Indian about pollution. I was very moved by it. So it was quite something to now learn what a manipulation that was, even though recycling is a good thing. Wow . . . Much gratitude for all who helped bring this information to light, especially to Bart Elmore for his determination to get at the research to reveal yet another instance where facts have been buried or misrepresented to the public to benefit the business. The question for me these days is: when will the general public, and not just a few of us, get wise to the fact that often the public is being misled, in the interest of money and power to a small few, to detriment of the many and our world!!

[@johnchambers8528]

I always preferred the taste of coke in the old returnable bottles. Up until the lat 70s I still could buy returnable bottled coke at my beer distributor. Unfortunately I guess the local Coke bottler decided it was not worth the trouble or had the volume to continue with it. I do still buy Coke and other brands in plastic bottles and do curbside recycling but do not really know if the soda companies make good on properly recycling of the plastic bottles.

[@josephpadula2283]

In many states, like California , you can get Mexican made coke with Real sugar in glass bottles instead of high fructose corn syrup in plastic bottles . So which country is the rich one again ?

[@josephpadula2283]

In many states you can get Mexican made coke with Real sugar in glass bottles instead of high fructose corn syrup in plastic bottles . So which country is the rich one again ?

[@logans3365]

Still America, but rich is not a good measure for quality of life, it is however a good measure for corruption level

[@vivayo4588]

As a kid in the late 80's and early 90's in Spain, we had glass returnable Coca-Cola 1L bottles. I recall clear as day returning one and buying one each day for the consumption of our household of 1 child and 2 adults. Not a hassle but a normal leisure trip to the local store. Plastic is a business, a huge one: is not just the savings for Coca-Cola but the earnings for Dupond and the oil industry. The oil and plastic industry is a dirty one that is not supporting itself, greed and destruction in a neat package, they are destroying EVERYONE's resources and ecosystems for a profit for a handful of individuals.

[@jayski9410]

I've always wondered why the issue of deposits never came up with the dairy industry? Initially milk came the same way, in glass bottles that once emptied you left back out on your doorstep in your milk box and the milk man picked them up then left you fresh ones in return. Not to mention, you could leave a note for any additional dairy products like butter, cheese or whipping cream. And of course, no one had heard of "porch pirates" in those days.

[@imjody]

If there are states who don't recycle bottles/cans, then surely it would be a smart move to go to those states, grab up all the bottles and cans, bring them to a state that does, and cash in!!!

[@fcscouto]

that would not be smart, its illegal to transport cans or bottles from one state to another with the intention of redeeming a cash payout

[@grtjr71]

We went after the tobacco companys so we should go after companys like Coke as well!

[@JamesFox1]

Thank You !!!

[@deserteagle7032]

Coke tastes so much better from the glass bottles- the glass bottle holds gas pressure better. Here in South Africa, we still get the 1,25l reusable Coke bottle. And it's much cheaper than the equivalent plastic bottle. Same with the breweries and beer bottles. Worse is the disposable glass bottles.

[@richardsnodgrass8647]

People that I've known have been saying that glass should be used again since the 1990's. . . . Just saying. 🙂

[@chilesauce7248]

I Chile they have 2 litre plastic bottles that are returnable/resusable, that have a deposit of 300 pesos.

[@3ngi_n33r]

The fact that they don’t really use real sugar anymore is more than a deal breaker. I can’t even find throwbacks.

[@veganismyname]

The fact that cocaine was the cure for opiate addiction tells you how addicting opiates are

[@pconrz]

Not so much Coca-Cola but Monsanto put the plastic soda bottle into market. Blaming Coke for this problem is like blaming Ford for all the emission problems. Yes they participated but the source was another company, another industry.

[@yearight1205]

The problem is that the corporations are getting smarter. This video covers how you were dooped by a bunch of old greedy men a long time ago. You do realize that the old greedy men of today are a thousand times worse? We live in an age where they have you supporting their destruction of the planet by believing that the things that they're pushing are actually good for the environment. It's really interesting to watch.

[@keithfoundfun]

Go ahead, turn away, be a part of the problem and chug your Coca Cola🤡

[@wahid3837]

Here in South Africa we still retained the glass 500ml and 300ml bottles. However there are plastic counterparts aswell

[@ChupacabraRex]

I'd hardly say that glass bottles world-wide have been FULLY replaced, but I primarily see them in restaurants to be perfectly honest. A lot of the glass bottles where lost, so plastic was simply easier.Sadly, companies aren't people. They simple want cheaper things, nothing else matters.

[@TakenTook]

Glass bottles were still the norm when I was a kid, but I remember the transition to plastic for soda/pop packaging. I didn't like the taste of the beverages in the new packaging, and was even more distressed as additional food products started switching over to plastic, such as fruit juices. Pop in metal cans is still available, both then and now, so I switched to that decades ago for the most part, although it's more expensive per serving. And from what I read, there's a plastic lining inside the cans as well, so we are still having that exposure to plastics whether we want it or not. The more difficult thing is certain other products that I really like no longer having glass packaging options, like certain brands of fruit juice. When my son was little, I went out of my way to buy different brands that still shipped in glass, but now I get a combination.

[@capthraw]

This is why the State of Oregon passed the nation's first "Bottle Bill" that banned No Deposit/No Return beverage containers in 1971...

[@d.russellmoros7841]

Thanks for this video. This history makes a case once again for a centrally planned economy controlled by the workers themselves. Workers wouldn't consciously poison ourselves nor the planet's ecosystems.

[@johnstinson1304]

Industry is only interested in maximizing profit. Industry must be FORCED to comply. If that's socialism, then I'm a socialist.

[@hndrwn]

I grew up in Asia. We also used to have those glass bottles. Now their plastic bottles are all we have in marts and rivers 😢

[@SunnyAquamarine2]

It's sooooo sad for me, born in the mid 70's, to remember some of this, and KNOW now, we've been lied to my entire life Not only by companies, but by our own governments. From the smallest to the largest of any of them, all they have ever cared about for my ENTIRE life has been money. They've never cared about people, animals, or the planet. And now it's too late for all of us. But what's their response? "Let's get rid of all the poor and oppressed people, so the wealthy might be able to survive a few more years or maybe decades. They aren't even hiding that this is now their plan and what they are indeed implementing. 😢

[@fivefiveniner1537]

As a kid of the 80's growing up in Silicon Valley I would collect the bottles from mine and other households to turn in for the refund. Early one Summer I collected enough change to buy a Great America season pass. I did this two years in a row. Great memories Great America, I'm gonna miss that place! 💯 🇺🇲 ❤️

[@rosepearl7092]

No. Shoving your hands deeper into consumers' pockets is not the way to go. If Coke truly cared about the impact, they'd go back to selling the syrup -- directly to the consumers. Then consumers would mix it with the soda water/seltzer/ginger bug at home and deal with the bottling themselves.

[@SnarkyRC]

Coke only cares about making money. They're pure Capitalism at work.

[@maltedmilk6888]

All beverages taste better when they are bottled in glass, as opposed to aluminum or especially plastic, because plastic definitely Alters the taste of the beverage

[@soundbyte]

Possibly the best advertisement for SodaStream I've ever seen. No wonder Pepsico bought it.

[@JOESMITH-qs8ue]

If you ever wonder why some people are environmental cynics remember plastic bottles, bags, and straws were sold a clean alternatives.

[@jimburris]

Of course, using returnable glass would reduce plastic waste, but increase the cost/weight of transporting to market, require a second trip to return empties, and use copious amounts of water and chemicals to clean and sanitize the returns. There is no free lunch.

[@Norm475]

I remember the crying Indian commercials. I've read that the man who played the part of the Indian was not Indian. I also live near two major Indian reservations and it used to be like driving through a city dump until they both got casinos and they started to clean up the area.

[@ThinkLascivious]

Create laws that force companies to put higher percentage of deposits... while maintaining fair market prices.

[@tyranix9785]

Great video. Nice job.

[@BooB-ej5xr]

Even if you recycle not everything in the landfill will be recycle properly Boycotting these corporations is best thing to do for the environment and our personal health

[@woof3598]

in Iowa, stores still charge a deposit but dont HAVE to take them back

[@John_Lee_]

Stop drinking that swill

[@1ACORNLAWN]

I was in Nepal at the base of the Himalayas back in 89... the amount of coke trash is astounding In the jungles of Thailand , Cambodia there are millions of incomplete burns where the plastic did not burn In central America coke bottles make it to the ocean American corporations own our country and politics ....vote mudder fuojers , vote

[@nox5555]

You can blame Coke for people being to stupid to correctly burn something very flamable...

[@deplorablecovfefe9489]

My mother had two hatchback windows blow out because she would leave full 8 packs set in the back of her car for weeks. Coke had a whole dept. to deal with claims from glass bottles exploding. Glass bottles were a liability. Amazing was Michigan's can problem that filled all the drainage ditches. It was ridiculous. Then a 5 cent return had people in ditches cleaning them out for those nickels.... In a couple years it was all cleaned up.

[@butchknouse8316]

Iowa has had a 5 cent deposit on ALL beverage containers since the late 70s.

[@nealkrueger6097]

Glass returnable bottles were touted as fuel inefficient because of their weight. But I think k the real reasons why they shoved them down the consumer throats is the added cost of return shipping, cleaning, Sterilization , breakage from internal stresses , shipping impacts, thermal shock and potentially dangerous substances returning in the bottle . As a kid, there were many times that I would walk picking up empty bottles on the roadside . Since my parents would not buy me soda( Colke or Frosty Rootbeer)., They, however, would allow me to earn some by using the deposit system to buy a soda .

[@logans3365]

If we were using electric trains like we should be instead of semi trucks, then fuel wouldn’t be an issue. Theres a whole different corporate lobby group causing that problem though. All the problems we face today I can think of have been traced back to greedy business men, usually bribing the government, and brainwashing the citizens with propaganda. Straight evil

[@crawkn]

Perhaps returnable glass will one day return, but until then a good compromise could be to ban plastic in favor of aluminum containers. Aluminum will always have an intrinsic value making it worthwhile to collect, and states could add a deposit small enough not to be a deterrent to purchase which would add enough incentive to reward the efforts of those who retrieve discarded containers. Resealable aluminum bottles would have enough aluminum a deposit wouldn't be necessary. Also home soda machines which are affordable (which Soda Stream isn't) could save on shipping water content and make all bottles reusable.

[@KJ-vc3sw]

Why not run ancillary conduits along water mains and inlet pipes so that ice cold delicious soda pop can be funneled directly into each and every household for a monthly fee? That way we can all be smiling and happy and living the good life!

[@cedriclynch]

Would this be good for everybody's health?

[@josephpadula2283]

He is joking about piping Coke in to homes.

[@KJ-vc3sw]

@@cedriclynch Good point. What was I thinking? I'm going to call my investors and cancel the project.

[@agentp6621]

I asked the question why switch to plastic. It’s way lighter, way cheaper and far more impact resistant. If your job is to get as much product to the market as cheaply as possible. Plastic is a no brainer. Lighter product packaging weight means reduced fuel consumption. Cheaper to make a virgin plastic bottle instead of a virgin glass bottle. The narrative I heard before was that people weren’t recycling or collecting their deposits anymore. I think it’s because a coke bought on a road trip from Ohio and finished in Kansas meant you’re outside the original bottler’s market. So you couldn’t collect your deposit from next bottler and Lord knows when you’ll be in Ohio next. So it fell to the wayside to return bottles. Then there’s the idea of durability. Glass bottles are durable but they will break. Imagine a pallet of bottles that falls over. Nothing but glass and sticky cola everywhere. What about a pallet of plastic? Almost no broken bottles. Toss them back on the pallet and get them to the market. Eliminating wasted product. Plastic is so cheap that no one values it like they do glass. So how else do you convince me to return my bottle? Can a plastic bottle be recycled?

[@ScottClevelandmi]

We have a deposit in my state. I don’t take them back because the work to take it back is not worth 10cents. I say work because most places have no incentive to return bottles. The state does not pay them. So the machine suck if they work at all. Some places only accept empty’s during curtain hours. Gas stations just do not accept returns.

[@smvwees]

It is only pretty recently that in The Netherlands we have to pay deposits on plastic bottles and even more recently also on tin cans (actually alumin(i)um cans with a plastic film). Some years ago we had containers only for plastic waste, but that is now replaced with the deposits in the hope of people returning it. And since the Dutch are known for being stingy they won't let any opportunity for getting a few cents back go.

[@MrSam2497]

I really don't understand why US doesn't have deposit on plastic bottles and cans like we have in Europe

[@SDWNJ]

The “Crying Indian” ad played throughout the seventies, not just 1971.

[@LarryNgetich]

I'm in Kenya and I'm holding a glass-bottle Coke in my hand right now. Maybe it's a regional thing

[@ThatOpalGuy]

its about PROFIT. thats the only reason. glass is heavy and expensive to ship. you can ship more coke for the same price.

[@SnarkyRC]

That's capitalism for ya

[@leoyoung7547]

In BC, we have voluntary compliance with deposits in the high 90%'s.

[@Liisa3139]

Broken glass is even worse as waste.

[@peopledustcanada]

Only material that should be used as a throw away item or package or container...is paper, wood, or glass. At least these items are truly recyclable, or at the very least disinagrate to simple compounds very quickly. Glass even if throw out crushes back to sand...

[@danielparsons2859]

The 'Easy Goer' - man I drank a lot of coke growing up. I won't touch it now. I can' remember the last time I drank it. Or any soft drink for that matter. Telling the population that promoting and selling these products to kids is freedom is a lie and criminal if you consider the harm it does.

[@JohnSmith-xd8do]

Plastic is harmless in all ways

[@terywetherlow7970]

Thank Dart Container for the horrendous Styrofoam cups.