Personal Blog of Ellen MacArthur

• Richard Atkinson
• 1st November, 2007

I very sensible idea. Just as we used to have with milk bottles. I still remember the change from milk in returnable bottles, to cartons. The reason given then was that the bottle washing was too expensive. Perhaps with the swing to paying the real cost of energy the tide may swing back. It’s worth noting that there are a few small businesses that still do take back their bottles and reuse them, with a deposit payed for the old bottle. I know of a dairy and a wine company locally that do this. I also noticed that it was standard in Germany around ten years ago to pay a deposit for bottles, although I don’t know if they reused them, or crushed and melted them.

Cheers
Richard
Hobart, Tasmania, Australia.

• Claire
• 2nd November, 2007

You pay a deposit in Germany and they reuse them, and I remember the good old days of glass milk bottles too - hopefully they can be brought back onto action.

On a slightly different tack, I wrote to a while back and sent you a morsbag which is a reusable cloth bag made from old curtains or duvet covers etc so that resources are not used up by creating new plastic, just cotton that’s already been made. The idea is that we give them away for free - guerilla bagging - that way fewer whales, albatrosses and turtles should have to ingest them as they mistake plastic bags for jellyfish and die.

I know it’s really cheeky to ask, but could you judge an online competition we’re running at the moment Ellen? You seem like the perfect connection with the sea to do it… Keep up the good work.

• Louise
• 2nd November, 2007

Rememeber when you used to get 10p back when returning your benshaws bottles to the shop? x x x

• Laurence Roberts
• 7th November, 2007

5p Corona bottles surly (i think my dad used to get a shilling for milk bottles :D)