A test of ethics

In My Humble Opinion
1

My day job is driving a pick-up/delivery van for a dry cleaning company. As part of that, I also pick up used hangars that customers don’t want to keep, and then dispose of them in the dumpster back at our delivery hub.

A while ago, I found out that we mailed out a newsletter to our customers that specifically said that we recycle our hangars that we pick up from them. Oh? You mean having them buried in landfills for ages, then having our descendants uncover them 1000 years from now and re-smelting them is recycling. I mentioned this to our hub manager, and he agreed to talk to someone about the false statement in our literature.

Then a couple of weeks ago, we distributed little hangar caddy boxes to our top customers. (The boxes are triangular-shaped, with a gap to allow the hook to pass through.) The customer can place these out with their drop bags when they’re full, and we’ll remove the hangars. On the boxes it says “[My company] hires [well-known charity organization’s] emplyees to sort hangars.” When we got these boxes, the other drivers and I asked, “So, we’re going to recycle now?” Our driver manager said no; that we were to keep using the dumpster. WTF!?

I was pretty livid, and felt very slimy handing these out along with a note stating that my company was environmentally friendly because 1) we didn’t used PERC for cleaning and 2) we recycled hangars. So, since it seems were using these statements to keep and potentially recruit new customers, doesn’t this constitute fraud?

I found out that afternoon that our cleaning plant (out of town) does hire someone like the literature says. But there’s no official system for sending our collected hangars to them. I unofficially send mine down in a garment bag in the hope that they’ll be processed like advertised.

Lately, I’ve notices some hangars coming back in the bin that I sent them down in, so I have a feeling the plant doesn’t want to handle them particularly. I have a feeling that I might be called on my hangar export. At that time, should I 1) ignore them and continue exporting hangars, 2) refuse to pick up hangars until we have set up a recycling system at our hub, 3) Hi, Opal, 4) quit in righteous indignation?

2

I’d pick option 2) personally. But that would depend on a) whether the work environment is likely to be tolerant of such, um, constructive criticism, as opposed to seeing it as insubordination, and b) how much you need the job.
I’d also like to point out that a hangar'' is a large building used primarily for storing aircraft, while a hanger’’ is that little metal thing you hang clothes on…

[waits for Gaudere’s law to strike]

3

raises hand

I’ll take a few hundred hangers, I give the wire to my students for art projects.

Funny that I’ve had absolutely no luck in getting donations for the two months I’ve been trying.

4

Your company is unethical. Now that your employers know your attitude, sending an “anonymous” copy of the claim to the local TV news guy would not be a good idea.

You may have noticed thrift stores like the Salvation Army and the Lady of Perpetual Polyester Guild receive their clothing donations in boxes, but display them on hangers.

5

I think you ought to let someone know who is in a position to do something about it (IOW, someone from the “outside” who can put pressure on the company.) However, like j.c. said, if you are the only one complaining, they just might figure out it was you who did it.

6

I’d quit, and tell them why. But not before getting another job. The job market sucks right now.

7

I think the right thing to do is to state your concern clearly to your supervisor: we said this, we do this, we don’t do this. If your supervisor has a hard time with ethics, discuss how this would be a really dumb thing to get bad publicity over. Have a plan in place for what you think would be done. Either be proactive and look into what it would take to actually do the recycling, or state what marketing you are asking to discontinue. If your supervisor doesn’t take action right away, give him a day to think about it, then go back and explain you’ll take it to his manager if he doesn’t. Give him the opportunity to go with you. This is going over his head, but it’s not a complete no-no if you’re up front about it.

Wish you the best of luck!

8

Something here doesn’t make sense to me. If your company discards the hangers, why do they collect them from the customers in the first place? If it is an attempt to garner goodwill their best move would be to tell the customers to keep the hangers, free of charge!

9

I worked at a NYS camp that had a “recycling” program. Above the sorting bins we had instructions on how to clean the cans, sort the plastic, and take off the labels.

It all went into the dumpster.

This was the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

10

Oh, they don’t know my attitude about this. I have been sending the hangers down since day one, but I doubt the people who unload the bins pay attention to whose bin has bags of hangers in it. But I haven’t spoken to anyone in authority specifically about our new hanger “recycling” program.

I’ve been thinking that the next time my boss’s boss is down that I’ll ask him about this policy. If he hems and haws rather than take action, then I might play my ace: A local news radio host is also the former president of the organization that we say we hire to sort the hangers. He might take a personal interest. :smiley:

If you’re anywhere within driving distance of the DC/Baltimore area, I’d be glad to give you all that you’d like.

Haha! Good one! You wouldn’t believe the volume of hangers that my customers accrue. One lady had a mountain about 4 feet high in her garage (that she thankfully didn’t give to me).