Anybody Dumpster Dive, Here?

[Travelover]

I got a kick out of this article. I've been know to pick up the odd thing off the curb and regularly scrounge metal at a recycler, but this guy takes it to a whole new level.

The Pro Dumpster Diver Who's Making Thousands Off America's Biggest Retailers | WIRED

 

[Baby Grand]

Another title for this thread might be "Bin diving lately?".
On our second date, at my wife's suggestion, we went bin diving in a dumpster in the parking lot of the swanky restaurant we'd just dined at.
The Plant Manager and I fondly refer to that evening as The Night of Five Sewing Machines.
I knew at that moment that I had found my one true love.
A fabric store near the restaurant had gone out of business - their loss; our gain.

 

[motownbrowne]

I used to check the dumpster at a local beer distribution business. Usually the odd six or twelve pack, but one night we scored 27 full cases of Alaskan Winter. Ever since then I've never been able to bring myself to pay for it. That was a long time ago, though and I don't visit dumpsters much anymore.

 

[Happy Gilmore]

There's nothing like a good curbside find taken with an ounce of humility.

 

[PILOON]

The dumpster at a local metal fabricator is one favorite.
Lots of neat handy cut offs.

When I did a lot of EBay sales the dumpster behind a flower shop provided peanut packing and the pharmacy all the small boxes you ever wanted.

 

[Bird]

Never done any dumpster diving myself, but this reminds me of the night when I was a young police officer and got a call to "meet complainant" at an apartment. A lady of about 40 years of age said she'd taken off an expensive diamond ring and laid it on the counter by the kitchen sink while she was doing the dishes, then later took the garbage out and threw it in the dumpster. Then she missed her ring and felt pretty sure it went in the dumpster with her garbage. There was a lot of garbage in that dumpster and I doubted that I could have found a ring anyway, but she said she'd get in there and hunt it herself but she had no way she could get in there.

I picked her up and put her in there, and sure enough she found her garbage bag and found the ring.:laughing: She was just happy as a pig in a mud puddle.:laughing:

 

[k0ua]

Never done any dumpster diving myself, but this reminds me of the night when I was a young police officer and got a call to "meet complainant" at an apartment. A lady of about 40 years of age said she'd taken off an expensive diamond ring and laid it on the counter by the kitchen sink while she was doing the dishes, then later took the garbage out and threw it in the dumpster. Then she missed her ring and felt pretty sure it went in the dumpster with her garbage. There was a lot of garbage in that dumpster and I doubted that I could have found a ring anyway, but she said she'd get in there and hunt it herself but she had no way she could get in there.

I picked her up and put her in there, and sure enough she found her garbage bag and found the ring.:laughing: She was just happy as a pig in a mud puddle.:laughing:

So you threw some lady in a dumpster? wow! All is well that ends well!

 

[mjarrels]

Years ago, my son worked at K-mart and would dumpster dive. Brought home many damaged goods that were throw away but still useful.

mark

 

[bigtiller]

A co-worker of mine found a broken hammer handle in the trash one day and at the end of the shift he walked out the gate into the parking lot. A security guard stopped him, and to the office they went. He was suspended for 2 weeks without pay.

 

[George2615]

I work in a commercial bldg. of medical offices. I find lots of things thrown in the dumpster from time to time that I can find a use for in my garage. Shelving, cabinets, air compressors, metal, light fixtures etc. Most of the items thrown in come from bldg. renovations and there is nothing wrong with them. Its amazing to see some things that they discard.

 

[Deere Dude]

I hope I never get thrown into a dumpster full of doughnuts. I would never leave :laughing:

 

[Travelover]

A co-worker of mine found a broken hammer handle in the trash one day and at the end of the shift he walked out the gate into the parking lot. A security guard stopped him, and to the office they went. He was suspended for 2 weeks without pay.

I worked for a US automaker and it made me weep to see what got tossed out, but one never, ever took anything out of the dumpsters there if you valued your job.

 

[MossRoad]

Hee hee, we went dumpster diving last night at a wholesale forest. Got nothin'!

But many times we've gotten dozens of beautiful flowers. Take em home, unpackage them, smash the ends and put them in a 5 gallon pail of warm water. Pretty crazy that they throw that stuff out, but I actually worked for a wholesale florist about 28 years ago. Once flowers hit a certain date in our coolers, they wouldn't keep in a retail florist for more than a few days, and would certainly never make it to a customer's home and last. So every Saturday we'd toss out dozens of bunches of 25 flowers. However, the boss made us actually get into the dumpster and jump up and down on them to bust them all up specifically to discourage dumpster divers. The homeless people would pull the flowers and sell them on the corner to passing motorists and the local florists were not happy to see shopping carts of flowers being sold on the street for a dollar or two. That's just the way it was. He had to protect his customers and his business.

 

[Sprinklerman]

I pick out lumber from construction dumpsters all the time . If I have my pick up I throw in anything metal for my scrap metal pile .

 

[2458n]

Worked at a large landfill for a guy that was off work for two months due to surgery. I am telling you that you would not believe what comes into a place like that. Honda, and General Motors containers had everything they made come in as trash. Walmart and Sears were both stuffed full of new things. Same old story no one was allowed to get out of your machine for any reason. The mechanics who worked on the equipment after hours would have worked there for free. Compacting fiberglass boats was a team event.

 

[japody]

People around here think it should be an Olympic event! :laughing:

 

[Looking4new]

I don't dumpster dive, but I DO dive at the local dump. Mostly for construction material but also for electronics and I regularly check out the steel pile.

 

[Mace Canute]

I've been picking up little pieces of metal , shafts, etc, at a local scrap metal dealer and seen several large wooden shipping crates from a local agri manufacturing plant in their scrap pile. These were filled with specific items to be shipped with the equipment they manufactured and retail they likely would have been several hundreds of dollars each. They wouldn't sell them to the general public because of an agreement with the agri company. One time there I saw three skid steer buckets, big ones too, sitting there about to be chopped up into scrap pieces. Same thing, couldn't sell them to the public.

A friend says it would make you cry at what is in the garbage bin at his place of work. Apparently if they make a mistake in ordering something they will bin it because the cost of the paperwork to return it is more than the cost of the item. Crazy, eh?

Another friend works at a large construction outfit that does large projects in the millions of dollar range. They order everything they need to do the job beforehand and whatever is surplus afterwards is also binned because of various legal reasons. Again, thousands of dollars of materials go into the bin.

 

[dmccarty]

We have "dumpsters" at work for surplus materials. Unreal what goes into those boxes. Supposedly, they are sent out to recycling so at least some money is recovered.

Years ago when we went from offices to cubes, the amount of perfectly good material that was thrown away was unreal. I hope the material was recycled. What was mind boggling was the solid wood doors getting stacked into a huge tractor trailer sized dumpster. I hope those did not go to a land fill. Those doors would cost hundreds each and there were thousands of doors thrown out.

Our county collection centers used to allow dumpster diving but this ended when two guys got into a knife fight over metal. Though, I thought it was absurd for the dumpster diving to be allowed before that happened. They guys were showing up with pick ups and trailers and they would take the metal for recycling money. The county should have been recouping that money not giving it away. After the knife fight that ended the little scheme. It is one thing to allow dumpster diving so that one man's trash is another man's treasure but these guys were making some serious money off the collection centers. They might as well have allowed me to shovel the aluminum cans into the back of my pickup from the can dumpster. :laughing:

Later,
Dan

 

[300UGUY]

A friend of mine worked for a large home builder. Any excess matieral was destroyed before being disposed of. Nothing left the worksite. They said it was to discourage theft.