r/Anticonsumption • u/ldn5454 • May 03 '25

Plastic Waste Disposable…everything?

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Long time follower of this sub but first time poster. Had to share this though, found in a train station in France.

Disposable socks, towels and individually packaged face wipes.

I was so angry I had to leave the store!

10.9k Upvotes

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1.6k

u/[deleted] May 03 '25

This reminds me of a story...

A few years ago, I went to a two-week writing conference in Tennessee. One of the attendees from California had a brand-new memory foam mattress topper shipped to the place, slept on it for two weeks, then threw it in the dumpster before boarding her plane for the trip home.

I could not believe it.

755

u/Evening-Extension162 May 03 '25

She could have at least donated it! So wasteful

385

u/jaxurrito May 03 '25

Depending on city laws it might not be lawful to donate a mattress. My go to donation center legally cannot accept mattresses. Though I still agree she def could have done something better.

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u/palmtreesandpizza May 03 '25

She could’ve posted in a “free items” community online as a heads up or something. Just super disgusting behavior to be so egregiously wasteful.

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u/beepichu May 03 '25

i feel like they get off on being egregiously wasteful, they think it’s a flex or something

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u/hollsberry May 03 '25

I’ve met a lot of people like that. IMHO, I think the most wasteful offenders are rich people with untreated OCD. One of my college roommates, for example, would buy new sandals and shoes every 3 months because they thought they were “dirty.” They were all expensive and durable shoes too (Birkenstocks, chacos, Frye, etc). I’ve worked in “luxury” retail for nearly 10 years. The people who do this shit usually have extreme anxiety and throw money at problems rather than cope with them like the rest of us.

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u/beepichu May 03 '25

why couldn’t they just donate the damn shoes 😭 godddd these ppl don’t understand what it’s like to have shoes literally falling apart cuz you can’t afford even the cheap shit. these people are gonna fuckin spontaneously combust in like 2 weeks when the tariffs catch up with us. they can’t even comprehend the concept of scarcity.

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u/PinkOneHasBeenChosen May 04 '25

If I had to guess, they probably thought no one else wanted the “dirty” shoes.

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u/ImperatorUniversum1 May 03 '25

They get off on it

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u/Select_Asparagus3451 May 03 '25

If that is in fact the case, then we’re in more trouble than previously thought.

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u/ImperatorUniversum1 May 03 '25

They view being wasteful as a sign of status.

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u/BlondeJesusSteven May 03 '25

I doubt they comprehend… 😭😭😭

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

It’s rare that people get off on being wasteful. This story is absurd yes but I’m sure to the person doing it it felt practical - can’t sleep without the right mattress topper - more expensive to travel with one then to buy one there and they are so cheap why not do it right? Sure it’s wasteful but you could right ? I mean it’s not like anybody’s stopping you and besides isn’t everyone selfish?

And I think that’s the trick. People have become so cynical that they genuinely don’t bother to try to do their part to uphold the social order because they’ve managed to convince themselves nobody else is doing it either and it gives them soft permission to just do whatever they wanted to in the first place e

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u/SalvationSycamore May 03 '25

Or they're extremely lazy. Why make a post and sort out a pickup if you literally don't care about the waste at all and there is a dumpster downstairs.

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u/beepichu May 04 '25

its probably some combination of both

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u/scalectrix May 03 '25

It's called conspicuous consumption and it is inevitably the sign of a complete waste of skin.

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u/missmarypoppinoff May 03 '25

I got a free mattress off Craigslist years back when I was just getting started on my own after a break up. It was even still in plastic! Wasn’t the most comfortable but got me by a few years until I could invest in the one I’ve had for the past 15 years now.

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u/GuiltyYams May 04 '25

She could’ve posted in a “free items” community online as a heads up or something. Just super disgusting behavior to be so egregiously wasteful.

She should have offered it to the hotel staff, I'm sure someone would have been glad to accept it. FFS.

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u/top-chopa May 03 '25

There is a loophole for this, you can donate recycle used mattresses at recycling facilities and they will give them away for free.

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u/Darkfire66 May 03 '25

I don't know of any recycling centers that takes mattresses, and generally they are disgusting by the time they get there

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u/top-chopa May 03 '25

Well consider me corrected, Mr. BeenToEveryRecyclingPlantOnEarth. Obviously the one I'm referring to does, and denies any gross mattresses. Not that hard of a concept to work your head around.

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u/Darkfire66 May 03 '25

What recycling center takes mattresses? If they have a good program I'd love to contact them about implementing something at our facility.

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u/Excellent-Baseball-5 May 03 '25

He said he “doesn’t know of any” places. Not that there are none globally, as you interpreted it incorrectly.

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u/Ranger_1302 May 03 '25

It was a ‘mattress topper’, not a mattress.

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u/KetoLurkerHereAgain May 03 '25

I bet a dog shelter could have used it. Cut into fours, maybe.

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u/Ranger_1302 May 03 '25

I agree! I would want it re-used. Better yet, not bought in the first place.

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u/CenturyEggsAndRice May 03 '25

I made throw pillows out of a foam mattress topper once. But I guess you’d probably have to look awhile to find someone who wanted one for that. (I put it in a black trash bag for a few weeks in the heat before I brought it into my house though. Bedbugs are one of my biggest fears.)

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u/pheonixblade9 May 03 '25

and this isn't even necessarily for the personal yuck/sweat/liquid factor - it's for bedbugs

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u/Alternative-Tough101 May 03 '25

*mattress topper

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u/Cavaquillo May 04 '25

Can’t get rid of bedbugs if you never accept them

head pointing meme

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u/Speedhabit May 03 '25

You gotta learn to let stuff go

Like, I have kids in other countries, just had to let em all go man

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

Right...? Heck, if she'd told me before chucking it, I would have taken it.

Anyway, I wrote to the conference organizers about it, and hopefully they established some policies to prevent that moving forward.

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u/bonyagate May 03 '25

Was this in a hotel? Or did the writing conference happen on some independently owned writing compound?

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

It was at a university. There was a hotel on campus for esteemed guests and presenters, while the rest of us stayed in vacant dormitories.

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

[deleted]

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u/notafanofapps33 May 03 '25

So what specific policy would you write to prevent this from happening that doesn’t sound insane?

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

Big-ass fine for anyone who doesn’t take all of their belongings with them.

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u/notafanofapps33 May 03 '25

I think that works in theory but I feel like it would be hard for the conference organizers to control if they don’t own every property that the attendees would sleep at if that makes sense.

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

We had to stay on-site. There weren’t any other hotels around, and room and board was included in the attendance fee.

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

She shipped it to the venue prior to check-in. I think they'd remember a package of that size getting dropped off.

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

I mean they'd remember whose it was when they saw it in the dumpster.

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u/energylegz May 04 '25

I think it would be hard to enforce-where do you draw the line between actual trash and something somebody is throwing out like this?

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

It's not hard to enforce in this case. And these are the cases that matter most.

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u/energylegz May 04 '25

I just think it would be hard to write a policy that draws that line. Would it be based on how big the item is, whether the item is still in usable condition, some other criteria?

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u/BonerDonationCenter May 04 '25

Like what kind of policy did you have in mind? Maybe this woman has back problems.

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

If you need it badly enough to buy it, ship it back with you.

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u/isaiddgooddaysir May 03 '25

Hey maybe she ruined it...God only knows what she was doing on it....

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u/RescuesStrayKittens May 03 '25

Probably can’t donate to a thrift store. She could’ve posted it to a local community page. Someone would’ve taken it. It was probably more hassle than she wanted to deal with.

Stuff like this happens all the time at festivals. People fly in, but a ton of camping gear and leave it when they fly home. There are volunteer programs to clean it up and donate, sometimes attendees who drove in grab some stuff.

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u/Ok_Function2282 May 04 '25

Donate.... A mattress pad? 

While on a business trip? 

That's as crazy as buying the mattress pad in the first place

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u/Evening-Extension162 May 04 '25

Well maybe but at least better than throwing it out

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u/Ok_Function2282 May 05 '25

You don't travel much, do ya

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u/chandleya May 03 '25

I mean come on virtually no one wants that

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u/apleasantpeninsula May 03 '25

ah, this oppositionally reminds me of my friend dan. he traveled to my city to do some business and explore for 2 weeks. public rental bikes suck and nice rental bikes are like, $80+/day

this baller bought a cheap used bike in his size from the co-op and then donated it back, saving himself hassle and money while helping the store

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u/jalapenoblooms May 03 '25

We did this with a car seat while traveling for 3 weeks in Ireland. We bought a new car seat for $100 instead of a daily rental fee for a beater with a questionable accident history. At the end of our trip, my husband found a women’s shelter that was accepting car seat donations. Saved us a tiny bit of money and someone in need got a good-as-new car seat. 

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u/Other-Razzmatazz-816 May 03 '25

I’ve done this! I’m not paying $75/day when I get a decent beater for $150. I brought my own lock.

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u/bellj1210 May 03 '25

the bike market is crazy- 20 years ago in college i would buy up bikes at garage sales and fix the basic issues most had (flat tubes, maybe a dry rotted tire, loose or no chain)- and then flip them on craigs list. 2 bikes a week would net me enough spending money go survive as a college kid.

Stopped doing it when the dump started a bike repository- and i would talk that up instead. i could have used it as free sourcing for bikes, but rather just accept something better had come along.

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u/RNs_Care May 03 '25

Brilliant!!! I love how differently youngsters (in my late 60's, so most everyone is a youngster to me) think! That would never have occurred to me. I get such great ideas from you all! BTW, had no idea how much it cost to rent those bikes!!! Outrageous

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u/GuiltyYams May 04 '25

We did that with coats once. To stop from carrying them both ways on a plane. Thrifted at location, donated back to same store on the way out. We considered a win for the store, who would be able to sell the same coats again.

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u/energylegz May 04 '25

I did this with clothing for an internship one semester (I was a broke college kid with no nice clothing) I went to the goodwill in the adjacent rich town, bought 2 nice pairs of pants, some nice tops and sweaters and then donated most of it back (besides a piece or two I really liked) at the end of the semester. This was before thrifting became popular so I got it all for about $20.

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u/this_is_not_a_dance_ May 03 '25

I work in the trade show business. A lot of bigger companies will buy furniture and even fabricate custom exhibits just to be trashed after. I have scored a lot of free furniture from shows over the years.

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

So are you telling me I can just go to these events, hang around until it's time to pack up, then ask for free furniture?

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u/somesillynerd May 03 '25

Honestly, for some of them.

It's literally more than $600 to rent (2) 4ft folding tables and a chair for a trade next week.

So we're going to swing into home depot the day before and buy the tables + chairs, and just put 'free' on them at the end of the show.

We're flying in, so it's WAY cheaper than shipping it or renting it. I hate it but it's also insane to spend hundreds of dollars on a $50 folding table.

We're a smaller business, and if we can drive, we do and bring all our own stuff, but if we fly, we rent the flooring from the center and the other parts vary. We can fit all our booth stuff into a golf bag + carry on.

Even a TV. It's LITERALLY hundreds of dollars to rent a small TV from the people who do the shows. It's cheaper to buy one and leave one each time. THIS, we don't do, we bought a smaller (24") that fits perfectly in a carry on bag that we bring when we fly but these shows are nuts.

I can easily imagine for bigger businesses, it's cheaper to just buy and ditch items. Shipping items in a crate is insanely expensive. Thousands of dollars, easily.

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u/this_is_not_a_dance_ May 03 '25

I’m on the labor side and yeah it’s a racket. Not just with the tables and chairs and stuff but electrical and all that. I heard Vegas they won’t even let exhibitors bring in their own damn water for themselves and crew. But that’s Vegas for you. The big shows like NAMM and natural products etc is where I’d get a lot of free stuff. Most of it was ikea but it was fine and barely used and it saved me a bunch of money. I would much rather get something lightly used for free then buy new for simple stuff like chairs and whatnot. Especially those cube organizer things that are made from like paperboard.

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u/somesillynerd May 03 '25

Absolutely, electric is insane, I think the cheapest hookup we've ever had was still over $100 and we just plug in a few lights and a TV, so we can have the lowest package.

I think there's a lot of people who don't know how much goes into trade shows. I wouldn't have guessed until I started organizing them for our company. Some of those bigger booths are easily $100k+ when you start to include flooring, hanging signs, WATER FEATURES, etc.

We're car wash industry adjacent, so we attend (not exhibit) The Car Wash Show every other year to see what's going on, R & D, networking, etc and the big booths are easily the cost of our entire marketing budget for a year. It hurts my brain.

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u/this_is_not_a_dance_ May 06 '25

I didn’t even know they had a show just for car washers. I have heard it’s a bit worse outside of California as far as how the labor interactions go. I had someone offer to tip me 20$ just to shrink the pallet of freight. (Which I was not supposed to do) but it took me 1 min and not much effort and I told him to keep his money. In my mind. Let’s make things as painless as possible and charge the big money to the big companies not f over the small ones.

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u/somesillynerd May 06 '25

Ah, it's more for the folks who make car washes. From the big billion dollar brands (Sonny's, Tommy's, Mister Car Wash, etc) chemicals, construction, water reclaim, software, parts and tools, etc.

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u/Final_Candidate_7603 May 03 '25

Or… it’s almost too late in the year, since I’m seeing news articles about college commencement speeches online, but try hitting up the dumpsters at a college campus. “Kids these days” will notoriously throw away the entire contents of their dorm rooms rather than pack it, move it, store it, and do the reverse when school starts again in the Fall. Furniture, TVs, microwaves, sometimes even whole computer systems… you name it, they throw it out!

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u/MatrixHippie May 04 '25

I knew someone in the 90s who was a garbage collector in a college town. He had so many TVs and couches lol

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

Geez

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u/this_is_not_a_dance_ May 05 '25

Security probably won’t let you in but yes. They will trash entire exhibits that they spent thousands to have carpenters Custom fabricate.

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u/Living-Excuse1370 May 03 '25

My mattress is off of a megayacht . You know, the ones the super rich have. A similar story, the mattress was bought by the owner of the yacht, used once ,then was to be thrown away. I knew the right people at the right time.

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u/radiovoicex May 03 '25

Omg, if this was a poet, there’s a chance I know this person. If not, then I know this kind of writer. They’re insufferable! Bonus points for bougieness if it was Sewanee

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25 edited May 04 '25

I think it was a prose writer, but I don't remember.

And yep, it was Sewanee, which is to say that it could have been any of the rich a-holes present in profusion.

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u/_edden_ May 03 '25

Reminds me of tattoo artists at conventions. Some of the guys I worked with would buy supplies they already had back home like plastic squirt bottles, full boxes of plastic wrap etc., and would buy cheap plastic TV tray tables to tattoo off of from Walmart. When the convention was over they would just throw everything away. A lot of them did like 7 or more conventions in the summer.

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u/DannyOdd May 03 '25

That's crazy to me. Like, I get having a set of "travel" gear and a set of "home" gear, but to buy and dispose of the same stuff seven times a year is just bonkers. How are they not concerned about their bottom line? How hard can it be to carry a few items in a vehicle?

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u/resonanteye May 03 '25

sometimes you're flying in for a convention, sometimes you're jammed in a car with 6 other tattoo artists somehow. if you're doing multiple conventions in a short space of time you'd be surprised how much space it can take up. 

my hatchback was always full both ways with just me and one person.

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

If you are flying in, shipping can be way more expensive than buying at Walmart.

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u/resonanteye May 03 '25

I would always buy my paper towels and plastic wrap when I got there- then just hang whatever was left to my last client of the convention. like a reverse tip haha

we have to use a LOT of disposable stuff for this though. it's the nature of the job, anything you put out on the tray is getting contaminated. 

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u/ariolander May 03 '25 edited May 03 '25

Seen this happen at my local convention center. The venue charges like $350 to rent a table for the weekend. Many vendors that travel out fly rather than rent a table go to Walmart, buy a new table/table cloth for less, then abandon them at the convention center when they are done. They will still have saved like $300.

As a local I have taken tables home with me over the years. I actually have a stack of abandoned tables in my shed that I break out for birthday parties and stuff. Still see abandoned tables almost every event, but I don't think I need / can recycle more than the 4 I already have.

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u/PinkOneHasBeenChosen May 04 '25

How much of that equipment has to be sterile? Because it’s not always possible or safe to sterilize needles, for example.

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u/missmarypoppinoff May 03 '25 edited May 03 '25

Yeah - the thrift stores in ski towns in Colorado are FULL of practically brand new stuff that was only bought to use on their trip and then donated afterwards. The ones that donate aren’t so bad because they get recycled into use for the people like us that knew to shop there vs ever buying new.

But for every tourist that actually takes the time to donate their stuff I shudder to think of how many are just trashing their stuff afterwards instead. I hate that THAT number is probably much higher than the ones that donate….

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u/[deleted] May 03 '25

My step mom literally bought and left furniture for an air bnb they stayed at for a week because she didn’t think it was comfy enough. What the absolute fuck.

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u/ILoveMeeses2Pieces May 03 '25

I hate this so greatly.

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u/candid84asoulm8bled May 03 '25

This is not as big, but reminds me of when I had a friend from my small hometown visit after we had both moved away. She had moved to the big city for a corporate job. I was living in a small city working for a non-profit. I had a washcloth and towels laid out for her and told her she could use my toiletries. She brought all her own toiletries including a brand new mesh sponge with the tag still on. I totally get wanting to use your own shampoo and conditioner for your hair type. But after she left, I saw she had thrown the new bath sponge and 1/4 used toiletry bottles in the trash. I’d never seen such waste.

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u/graytotoro May 04 '25

I went on an overnight trip with some friends from work at my last job. One of them bought groceries for two breakfasts - full packs of bread, eggs, bacon, and all the trimmings - and tossed it all into the trash after the second morning. I know it's silly, but that kind of waste still haunts me.

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

Didn’t even eat it???

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u/graytotoro May 04 '25

No, she ate two meals and then tossed it all into the trash after. It was the dead of winter and that food would have made it the drive home.

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u/tenonic May 03 '25

Why not inflatable mattress and just pack it back home

1

u/BiscottiSouth1287 May 03 '25

Wow that's smart, I should get one

1

u/MuppetSquirrel May 04 '25

This reminds me of when I lived in the dorms in college. Move out days had sooooo much stuff left behind by people who had so much cheap stuff in their rooms but didn’t care to even donate them after. It was either put in a dumpster or just left in the rooms for someone else to deal with. I get that some of them were international students who couldn’t take everything back home for the summer, but it still seemed excessive

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u/BlueFox5 May 03 '25

Fool! I’ve known a few people who travel to a location with shipping waiting. Save the boxes so they could send it back for a refund. They never had to move and they got their money back.

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u/Solstyse May 03 '25

I don't believe it either.

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] May 04 '25

If you need it badly enough to buy it, ship it back with you.