# Soda bottle: "NO REFILL" ??
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [January 26, 2012, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723 "2012-01-26T13:09:10Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/1 "2012-01-26T13:09:10Z")
I’ve noticed 2-liter 7-UP bottles at work that say, “PLEASE RECYCLE – _NO REFILL_.”
Really? What business is it of theirs what someone does with their empty 7-UP bottles? Besides, isn’t the recycle code supposed to be, “Reduce, _ **reuse** _, recycle”? Or are they worried that someone might use their bottles to start his own 7-UP bottling enterprise on the sly?
Whatever–surely they have no say what happens to the empty bottles, right?
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### Author:  [@Alley\_Dweller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alley_Dweller)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/2 "2012-01-26T13:27:59Z")
You are surely too young to remember this, but back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, soda pop used to be sold in glass bottles. A two cent deposit would be added to the price of the soda. Every store that sold soda would take back the glass bottles and pay you back your two cents. And when the soda pop truck came to deliver new soda pop, they would take the returned bottles back to the bottling plant where they would be washed and refilled with new soda pop.
That’s right. They wouldn’t be recycled. They would be refilled.
Then they started putting soda pop in metal cans and plastic bottles. They ran catchy ads on TV proclaiming “No deposit! No return!” Stores put up banners about the wonderful, convenient new soda pop also proclaiming “No deposit! No return!” Of course, they didn’t brag about the fact that the no-deposit-no-return bottles cost 50% more. But people loved them and eschewed the old refillable bottles. The old bottles went the way of the dinosaurs.
Just to remind people of the fact that they could chuck the new containers into the garbage (or throw them out their car windows), they were labeled “No refills.”
What you are seeing is just a quaint holdover from that era. You are perfectly free to refill the bottles to your heart’s content. Just don’t try and send them back to the soda pop bottler expecting them to be refilled.
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### Author:  [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/3 "2012-01-26T13:37:08Z")
Some plastic pop bottles can be refilled, and should be returned to the store or manufacturer rather than thrown away or recycled. In markets where both refillable and recyclable bottles are used, it’s useful to mark which is which so the consumer knows what to do with the bottle when it’s empty.
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### Author:  [@Hermitian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermitian)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/4 "2012-01-26T14:44:23Z")
> [@psychonaut](#):
>
> Some plastic pop bottles can be refilled, and should be returned to the store or manufacturer rather than thrown away or recycled. In markets where both refillable and recyclable bottles are used, it’s useful to mark which is which so the consumer knows what to do with the bottle when it’s empty.
Does this happen in the US?
I remember glass bottles that were returned in a rack at my fathers workplace 18 years ago or so. It was the only place that I ever saw it. This must have been after they stopped accepting returns from the general public.
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### Author:  [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/5 "2012-01-26T14:59:25Z")
The old soda bottles looked like [this](http://blog.themillionairenurse.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/old-soda-bottles-by-ben.seid_.jpg). Notice how they’re marked “return for deposit.” A common practice for homeless peopel in the era was to collect soda bottles so that they could return them to the supermarket for the deposit.
Also, different states had different deposit rules. That accounts for the “[Bottle Deposit](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bottle_Deposit)” episode of _Seinfeld_, in which Kramer and Newman scheme to take a bunch of soda cans to Michigan, which mandates a higher deposit than New York.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/6 "2012-01-26T15:15:29Z")
> [@Hermitian](#):
>
> Does this happen in the US?
Dunno - but to concur with **psychonaut** ’s post, I know it happens in Denmark - maybe with global markets and distribution being what they are, it’s necessary to mark the ‘no refill’ bottles in case they find their way into a country where bottles are predominantly refilled.
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/7 "2012-01-26T15:19:53Z")
FWIW, I sometimes buy milk in glass bottles. The 1 qt. bottles have a $1 deposit. I’m not a milk drinker, so there was a time when milk might go bad before I used it. So I would use powdered milk and keep it in a glass bottle.
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### Author:  [@FluffyBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FluffyBob)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/8 "2012-01-26T15:20:04Z")
I remember having a visitor from Texas a few years ago and being absolutely perplexed why someone had put empties in the garbage. I still have a hard time wrapping my head around it being standard practice in some locals to just throw away empties. I mean seriously?
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### Author:  [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/9 "2012-01-26T15:20:51Z")
> [@Hermitian](#):
>
> Does this happen in the US?
Refillable plastic bottles are very common in Latin America and Central Europe. Their use is rare, though apparently not unknown, in North America. Here’s [an article discussing refillable glass and plastic bottles in North America](http://www.informinc.org/pages/research/waste-prevention/fact-sheets/case-reopened-reassessing-refillable-bottles-executive-summary.html); it mentions that “[s]chool districts in Connecticut, New York, and Ontario have helped persuade dairies to sell milk in refillable plastic bottles instead of one-way cartons…”.
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### Author:  [@thatguyjeff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thatguyjeff)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/10 "2012-01-26T17:34:06Z")
AFAIK it’s a law.
The type of plastic used for most bottles is single use only and not designed to be refilled - perhaps due to the possibility of chemical leaching or something like that - just a guess tho.
Basically there is reusable plastic and single use plastic - and it’s regulated.
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### Author:  [@ballardfam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ballardfam)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/11 "2012-01-26T17:41:15Z")
> [@Alley\_Dweller](#):
>
> Of course, they didn’t brag about the fact that the no-deposit-no-return bottles cost 50% more.
They also didn’t brag about the fact that road trash increased. I remember driving from Washington state into Oregon in the 70’s and noticing the lack of bottles/cans along the roads. Oregon’s ‘Bottle Bill’ in 1971 mandating that 90% of such containers have a refund value made a big difference.
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### Author:  [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/12 "2012-01-26T17:46:54Z")
The idea is to prevent commercial re-use of the bottle.
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### Author:  [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/13 "2012-01-26T17:49:54Z")
> [@ballardfam](#):
>
> They also didn’t brag about the fact that road trash increased. I remember driving from Washington state into Oregon in the 70’s and noticing the lack of bottles/cans along the roads. Oregon’s ‘Bottle Bill’ in 1971 mandating that 90% of such containers have a refund value made a big difference.
Yup, when they introduced returnable bottles and cans to NYS in the early 80s it made a noticable difference in weeks. Although not _immediately_. In the first couple of weeks the sides of the road were still littered with returnables and you could collect several dollars sometimes just by searching the roadsides thoroughly. But people on both sides (throwers and collectors) wised up pretty quickly.
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### Author:  [@Sigene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigene)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/14 "2012-01-26T18:17:43Z")
I Think I still see the glass Coke returnable bottles in the grocery store, in the ‘Latin American’ section.
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### Author:  [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/15 "2012-01-26T18:18:47Z")
It was my understanding that the “no refill” bottles were not strong enough to withstand the bottling under pressure multiple times. The original “no deposit, no return” bottles were a glass-plastic blend (unlike the old heavy glass refillable bottles) that were designed to be one use only.
If you wish to keep the bottles and use them in your home for whatever, knock yourself out. If you want to bottle your own beer, have fun. You might end up with beverages and entertainment combined.
~VOW
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/16 "2012-01-26T18:27:22Z")
> [@thatguyjeff](#):
>
> AFAIK it’s a law.
>
> The type of plastic used for most bottles is single use only and not designed to be refilled - perhaps due to the possibility of chemical leaching or something like that - just a guess tho.
>
> Basically there is reusable plastic and single use plastic - and it’s regulated.
Part of this is just functional design. If you know a bottle will only be used once, you can make it with less plastic, simpler screw threads or closures etc.
If you want it to be reusable, you have to design it sturdy enough to survive collection, return, cleaning, recapping, etc.
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### Author:  [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/17 "2012-01-26T20:27:48Z")
> [@Sigene](#):
>
> I Think I still see the glass Coke returnable bottles in the grocery store, in the ‘Latin American’ section.
Yes.
I can also remember the first time I was in Honduras and got a Coca Cola to go. They poured it out a glass bottle into a plastic bag and stuck a straw in it. Small plastic bags litter the country.
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### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/18 "2012-01-26T21:09:25Z")
> [@Alley\_Dweller](#):
>
> What you are seeing is just a quaint holdover from that era. You are perfectly free to refill the bottles to your heart’s content. Just don’t try and send them back to the soda pop bottler expecting them to be refilled.
So they’re printing, “NO REFILL” on their bottles because they want to make sure I don’t get the idea of showing up at their factory door demanding they refill my bottle? Really?
> [@Acsenray](#):
>
> That accounts for the “[Bottle Deposit](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bottle_Deposit)” episode of _Seinfeld_, in which Kramer and Newman scheme to take a bunch of soda cans to Michigan, which mandates a higher deposit than New York.
But wasn’t that just a different CRV, which varies from state to state? Those bottles were going to be recycled, not refilled, right?
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/19 "2012-01-26T21:19:24Z")
> [@guizot](#):
>
> So they’re printing, “NO REFILL” on their bottles because they want to make sure I don’t get the idea of showing up at their factory door demanding they refill my bottle? Really?
More likely, that you don’t get the idea that you can return the bottle to the store, expecting that (a) you’ll get a refund of a deposit, and (b) they’ll send the bottle back to the bottling company to be re-used.
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### Author:  [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2012, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soda-bottle-no-refill/610723/20 "2012-01-26T21:25:49Z")
> [@guizot](#):
>
> So they’re printing, “NO REFILL” on their bottles because they want to make sure I don’t get the idea of showing up at their factory door demanding they refill my bottle? Really?
It’s not just a message for _you, personally_. It’s an indication to anyone who might come into contact with the bottle, including a commercial bottler, that this container was not meant for reuse.
> [@](#):
>
> But wasn’t that just a different CRV, which varies from state to state? Those bottles were going to be recycled, not refilled, right?
No, it’s not a commercial resale value; it’s a state-mandated deposit.
If it was a private recycler, the recycler could pay as much or as little as he wanted to take recyclables. The key was that it was a state-mandated deposit amount set for returns, which works the same way whether the container is refillable or not.
If you are in Michigan then certain retailers must by law pay the amount stamped on the bottle when it is returned, because that’s how much extra that Michigan consumers are required to pay when they purchase the beverages at retail.
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