Been waiting for all the boxes to go on sale again to get rid of my stash of VHS tapes responsibly. Since the collapse of RedCycle I’ve been using their soft plastics box at home to send away soft plastics.
30% off isn’t unusual for them however what is rare is when they do all of their boxes. Happy recycling ♻️
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Half the cost is postage, by the time you add in processing there’s not much (if any) money in it
$160 to take a box full of VHS tapes, properly separate out all the various plastics and metals in each tape then grind them down to plastic granules that are reusable for another purpose (i.e. being melted back to make a new plastic). And all the associated equipment and labour to do all that, along with shipping, marketing, etc.
They're lucky to break even (I'm not entirely sure they do, they live off a lot of corporate sponsorship). Meanwhile, I could go work at maccas for a day and take home more than $160.
Insane that people have to pay for things like this. Everything wrong with capitalism right here.
You’re right. This cost should be in the sale price, instead it’s currently externalised. It’s geared toward make, use/consume, dump. But we gotta get back to the old days of reusing.
$160 to recycle VHS tapes… i am in the wrong business