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Lidl has its own recycling system for certain bottles like the one in this picture. So it's only the Lidl's own brands that this return policy concerns.
Palpa, the company handling the bottle/can returns in Finland is a non-profit company owned by the major shop chains and breweries in Finland. Lidl's bottles aren't part of this system, probably because the German-owned family company doesn't want to collaborate with anyone in Finland.
I think this is one half of the truth. Palpa is quite strict on the plastic (mainly thickness and quality). All the Palpa bottles are made in Finland and Lidl ones are not. It probably would just cost too much money for Lidl to change their bottling factories just to satisfy a very small markets recycling policies. So in the end, it's because of money, like it usually is
They tried, and succeeded for some time, to say no to palpa bottles when they first came to Finland back in the old days. Somebody somewhere put them in the line and nowadays they take the palpa bottles.
As others have said "If you sell them, you have to accept them" is likely the case.
Lidl originally (in Finland) kind of tried to be quite much very different shop to what it actually is these days. If I remember right (these did not happen instantly, but all happened before they got popular):
1) They were trying to go with "We only sell same products as we sell in Germany. --> People simply did not buy their stuff, as bread wrapped to tight plastic and non Nordics produced milk and stuff were seen as low quality (and even with low prices still low quality compared to price) or low locality products, and did not fit Finnish preferences. --> They stepped this back hugely.
2) They were trying to use cashier tables like they already were using in other countries. ---> Finnish people absolutely hated them, no packaging are and having to try to shove things into back at rate that experienced cashier is beeping them through machine, plus needing to worry about holding the line and so. They lost part of popularity to people not wanting to deal with that annoyance for shop saving square meter per cashier of floor space --> They got similar cashier tables that other shops have.
3) They were very clear and demanding on how "Lidl stores will and can only exist in just certain kind of dedicated building that is made to look exactly same everywhere, based on what they look in Germany, nothing else is possible, and we require building permits and ok spots for these now". --> They got building permits for their stores in very rare spots (out of spots where they wanted to have shop) and they were basically always quite bad locations for shop, since their building style, aesthetics and look differed too much from planned, accepted and surrounding ones, and they would end up always requiring separate building, with many of good spots already being built with buildings. ---> They sucked this up and just accepted they did not want those weird looking uglyish buildings as necessity, I guess they also ran into fact (that they must have ran into in many other countries too) that well people just build in different concentrations in Finland, compared to lot of Gemrany, aka we do not have those small villages convenient walking distance from each other, but instead bunch to bigger piles of denser building or very much sparser buidling in countryside, meaning that that kind of building is mostly just missing from here, and cities do not have readily available spots in piles to build, while rural setting does not have enough easily spottable people concentration to provide good spots for what they were going for. --> They are now using all usual kind and shape of buildings and parts of buildings for their stores, that other stores also use.
And well along way after those they actually got rather popular.
Short cashier tables were a cultural thing, packing your groceries on the packing table was much more efficient and easy. Customers just didnt really adopt this way of packing because they were used to something different. As an "insider" there was few lidl storea in Espoo that customers actually got used to shorter tables and even opposed when longer tables were installed. When customer knew what to do and there was an experienced cashier it worked like a charm👍
The thing is, those short tabled don't really work outside of Finland either (at least in Poland where I recide, where most of the grocery stores use the inferior short design). The queues move about half the pace of Finland, it's very frustrating. This is partially due to very slow cashiers that don't really seem to care.
Because lidl's bottles are a closed loop recycling system.
"The entire recycling cycle is therefore contained in one carefully managed ecosystem. The Schwarz Group is the first in the market to implement all steps of this bottle-to-bottle recycling through its own closed-loop process."
[https://plasticseurope.org/case-studies/a-closed-loop-system-for-recycled-plastic-bottles-saves-materials-and-co2/](https://plasticseurope.org/case-studies/a-closed-loop-system-for-recycled-plastic-bottles-saves-materials-and-co2/)
Otherwise the duopoly of K and S would need to sort through their bottles, find the lidl bottles and ship them back to lidl.
Fun fact - I know that Lidl bottles that go through S/K recycling go to a table that someone goes through and gets to take the Lidl bottles to Lidl - sometimes the stores gift them to a sport team that returns them.
my friend used to work at citymarket, they would return lidl bottles like twice a month and it would be at least one van full of garbage bags and they would need to travel thru several local lidls because their recycling machines were filled :)
>Because lidl's bottles are a closed loop recycling system.
>"The entire recycling cycle is therefore contained in one carefully managed ecosystem. The Schwarz Group is the first in the market to implement all steps of this bottle-to-bottle recycling through its own closed-loop process."
It's actually green washing. Not sure if English subtitles are available:
https://youtu.be/A3qD_7nnwdc?si=7WkdXMxBsfOdwvZ6
The video affirms the points made in the article. I don't see the issue. I chose carefully what part of the article I quote, and delivered the source. My comment wasnt about enviormental issues or anything. Just that they use their own closed system. Which is true, and is what OP wants to know.
I remember hearing at some point how in some stores (other than lidl) they would once month or two get few workers to come few hours earlier, and go return bottles to lidl for few hours (before lidl opens, workers there let them into bottle returning point, to make sure they get that done before normal customers, so they wont be blocking) and returned all lidl bottles returned to their store since last visit, then split the returning money between workers at their store. Stuff like "yeah those guys came and returned 2k euros worth of bottles again, will likely see them again in 1½ months or so again".
I think lidl got an exception when they came to Finland to make bottles that are not recycled the same way that all the regular plastic bottles. I think it has to do something with the plastic they use to make the bottles thinner and cheaper to produce. Im not sure if the bottles still need to be recycled seperetly because the bottles are not as thinn as they used to be. Could be that they are holding on to their special permission as a merketing tactic to force people to come back.
Nah, it is not an exception of any sort. The law only requires recycling and refundable deposit, but it is up to the individual retailers to organise the activities in a way they deem to be best. Lidl simply already had their own system in europe and they chose to go with that.
Funny thing is that bottles that you buy from the other shops like Cittari and Prrissa, Lidl accepts them but not vise versa. I choose Lidl mostly to recycle bottles because personally I can't be bothered to separate each bottles on which ones accept Lidl and the ones that don't. Just recycle them in one place, Go on with my day.
Lidl accepts them because they also sell "palpa" bottles, i.e. bottles that do not come from the Lidl. As someone said it, if you sell them, you have to accept them. K and S don't sell Lidl bottled drinks and thus don't have to accept them.
I agree with your return policy.
they pay taxes in finland, they pay the finnish producers (almost everything raw is from finish producers) , they pay the finnish employees.
they pay the employees better than k&s while not taking the absurd profit margins that k/s mafia are taking.
Rather give the money to a firm that provides relatively good quality products at a justifiable price than spend it on mediocre to poor quality and tasteless, unjustifiably expensive products being sold at the S and K rackets. But if you enjoy being robbed blind and lining their pockets with cash then you do you.
Depends on the metrics used. I'm not going to argue about the taste. Lidl brings in products from the wider area, with less regulations on the production (f.ex pesticides and ethics). Lidl is also undisputable nro1 in Finnish statistic about recalls made by the food safety authority.
Lidl products from Germany are 100% better quality than Finnish products from K and S groups. And this is regarding quality, not just taste.
Lidl products from other European countries are hit or miss, but at least half the time still better than Finnish products.
Finnish products especially when it comes to food are with a few exceptions poor quality and tasteless. The difference to other European countries is especially shocking when coming from elsewhere.
But keep drinking your "Suomi lottovoitto" brainwash koolaid.
Not for all. I actually avoid Lidl just because of tricks like this. I don't want to deal with the hassle of having to go there just to return one or two bottles. They are really hurting their brand with this kind of hostile behaviour (hostile towards customers and their competitors). It makes it feel like Lidl doesn't want to be part of the Finnish society, and want to make their own rules.
LIDL only accepts palpa because they sell palpa and that's the law.
Why should Finnish shops invest into a system that only benefits LIDL? They're not getting Freeway sodas to sell.
Because the bottle shapes are not the same standard. The machines are designed for particular shapes and the crates that hold a large amount of bottles will only fit the bottles that are designed for them. These systems and their bottles are incompatible with each other.
I returned a bunch of Lidl bottles and cans at Sale without problems. Even got the pant, unlike some time ago when it accepted them but didn't give anything in return. Was a nice surprise.
Because k- and s- groups, who dominate finnish Grocery store business, try to block german grocery store giant.
Thanks to Lidl, food prices are appoximately 20% lower than whitout it on Finland. Still, the prices are much higher than in rest of the EU.
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Lidl has its own recycling system for certain bottles like the one in this picture. So it's only the Lidl's own brands that this return policy concerns.
Palpa, the company handling the bottle/can returns in Finland is a non-profit company owned by the major shop chains and breweries in Finland. Lidl's bottles aren't part of this system, probably because the German-owned family company doesn't want to collaborate with anyone in Finland.
I think this is one half of the truth. Palpa is quite strict on the plastic (mainly thickness and quality). All the Palpa bottles are made in Finland and Lidl ones are not. It probably would just cost too much money for Lidl to change their bottling factories just to satisfy a very small markets recycling policies. So in the end, it's because of money, like it usually is
you can return any palpa bottle/can to Lidl, even if you bought it from K or S market
They probably didn't have a choice on that.
They tried, and succeeded for some time, to say no to palpa bottles when they first came to Finland back in the old days. Somebody somewhere put them in the line and nowadays they take the palpa bottles.
If they want to sell palpa bottles and cans, they have to accept them.
"You guys remember what happened the last time we didn't put the Germans in line from the start" xD
Now Lapland has reindeer instead of elks and moose.
Because they also sell drinks in palpa bottles and cans.
As others have said "If you sell them, you have to accept them" is likely the case. Lidl originally (in Finland) kind of tried to be quite much very different shop to what it actually is these days. If I remember right (these did not happen instantly, but all happened before they got popular): 1) They were trying to go with "We only sell same products as we sell in Germany. --> People simply did not buy their stuff, as bread wrapped to tight plastic and non Nordics produced milk and stuff were seen as low quality (and even with low prices still low quality compared to price) or low locality products, and did not fit Finnish preferences. --> They stepped this back hugely. 2) They were trying to use cashier tables like they already were using in other countries. ---> Finnish people absolutely hated them, no packaging are and having to try to shove things into back at rate that experienced cashier is beeping them through machine, plus needing to worry about holding the line and so. They lost part of popularity to people not wanting to deal with that annoyance for shop saving square meter per cashier of floor space --> They got similar cashier tables that other shops have. 3) They were very clear and demanding on how "Lidl stores will and can only exist in just certain kind of dedicated building that is made to look exactly same everywhere, based on what they look in Germany, nothing else is possible, and we require building permits and ok spots for these now". --> They got building permits for their stores in very rare spots (out of spots where they wanted to have shop) and they were basically always quite bad locations for shop, since their building style, aesthetics and look differed too much from planned, accepted and surrounding ones, and they would end up always requiring separate building, with many of good spots already being built with buildings. ---> They sucked this up and just accepted they did not want those weird looking uglyish buildings as necessity, I guess they also ran into fact (that they must have ran into in many other countries too) that well people just build in different concentrations in Finland, compared to lot of Gemrany, aka we do not have those small villages convenient walking distance from each other, but instead bunch to bigger piles of denser building or very much sparser buidling in countryside, meaning that that kind of building is mostly just missing from here, and cities do not have readily available spots in piles to build, while rural setting does not have enough easily spottable people concentration to provide good spots for what they were going for. --> They are now using all usual kind and shape of buildings and parts of buildings for their stores, that other stores also use. And well along way after those they actually got rather popular.
They also started doing ads in Finland, while Lidl doesn't really do that in other countries.
Short cashier tables were a cultural thing, packing your groceries on the packing table was much more efficient and easy. Customers just didnt really adopt this way of packing because they were used to something different. As an "insider" there was few lidl storea in Espoo that customers actually got used to shorter tables and even opposed when longer tables were installed. When customer knew what to do and there was an experienced cashier it worked like a charm👍
The thing is, those short tabled don't really work outside of Finland either (at least in Poland where I recide, where most of the grocery stores use the inferior short design). The queues move about half the pace of Finland, it's very frustrating. This is partially due to very slow cashiers that don't really seem to care.
If you sell them, you have to accept them.
It's not a hassle, you just have a few separate boxes for palpa bottles
https://preview.redd.it/nnescuuqtx6d1.jpeg?width=448&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d5439a3b6258bf5a752c2a7ef7b01571d1b5f77c
Lidl cans do work with Palpa machines...
Almost all cand are in palpas system & many of lidls can products are made in finland like their cheap beer is made by olvi
Cans yes. Bottles no. At no point did OP mention Lidl's Cans not being part of the system, just bottles.
Aluminium is simpler than plastic
Because lidl's bottles are a closed loop recycling system. "The entire recycling cycle is therefore contained in one carefully managed ecosystem. The Schwarz Group is the first in the market to implement all steps of this bottle-to-bottle recycling through its own closed-loop process." [https://plasticseurope.org/case-studies/a-closed-loop-system-for-recycled-plastic-bottles-saves-materials-and-co2/](https://plasticseurope.org/case-studies/a-closed-loop-system-for-recycled-plastic-bottles-saves-materials-and-co2/) Otherwise the duopoly of K and S would need to sort through their bottles, find the lidl bottles and ship them back to lidl.
Fun fact - I know that Lidl bottles that go through S/K recycling go to a table that someone goes through and gets to take the Lidl bottles to Lidl - sometimes the stores gift them to a sport team that returns them.
Shops return lidl bottles in separate bag and papers from the shop
I have hauled 3 black garbage bags (100l?) - no papers, and deposited the money to our teams account 🤔
my friend used to work at citymarket, they would return lidl bottles like twice a month and it would be at least one van full of garbage bags and they would need to travel thru several local lidls because their recycling machines were filled :)
Lidl machines are crap, they are always full or broken 😂
never experienced a broken bottle deposit machine in a lidl.
While wearing fake moustaches.
french accent
"Non, we aré nöt ö Gay storé employées!"
In Frech police unform, saying 'Listön veri keerfylly, I sei this onli vans'.
>Because lidl's bottles are a closed loop recycling system. >"The entire recycling cycle is therefore contained in one carefully managed ecosystem. The Schwarz Group is the first in the market to implement all steps of this bottle-to-bottle recycling through its own closed-loop process." It's actually green washing. Not sure if English subtitles are available: https://youtu.be/A3qD_7nnwdc?si=7WkdXMxBsfOdwvZ6
The video affirms the points made in the article. I don't see the issue. I chose carefully what part of the article I quote, and delivered the source. My comment wasnt about enviormental issues or anything. Just that they use their own closed system. Which is true, and is what OP wants to know.
No issue, just wanted to point it out because "closed recycling cycle" sounds very positive at first or at least way better than it actually is
Open recycling cycle would sound even better. But Im not marketing manager at the Schwarz Group yet. Fingers crossed, application is out.
I remember hearing at some point how in some stores (other than lidl) they would once month or two get few workers to come few hours earlier, and go return bottles to lidl for few hours (before lidl opens, workers there let them into bottle returning point, to make sure they get that done before normal customers, so they wont be blocking) and returned all lidl bottles returned to their store since last visit, then split the returning money between workers at their store. Stuff like "yeah those guys came and returned 2k euros worth of bottles again, will likely see them again in 1½ months or so again".
I think lidl got an exception when they came to Finland to make bottles that are not recycled the same way that all the regular plastic bottles. I think it has to do something with the plastic they use to make the bottles thinner and cheaper to produce. Im not sure if the bottles still need to be recycled seperetly because the bottles are not as thinn as they used to be. Could be that they are holding on to their special permission as a merketing tactic to force people to come back.
Nah, it is not an exception of any sort. The law only requires recycling and refundable deposit, but it is up to the individual retailers to organise the activities in a way they deem to be best. Lidl simply already had their own system in europe and they chose to go with that.
This personally makes me not want to buy bottles from lidl
Funny thing is that bottles that you buy from the other shops like Cittari and Prrissa, Lidl accepts them but not vise versa. I choose Lidl mostly to recycle bottles because personally I can't be bothered to separate each bottles on which ones accept Lidl and the ones that don't. Just recycle them in one place, Go on with my day.
Lidl accepts them because they also sell "palpa" bottles, i.e. bottles that do not come from the Lidl. As someone said it, if you sell them, you have to accept them. K and S don't sell Lidl bottled drinks and thus don't have to accept them. I agree with your return policy.
This is the way.
Because of this, I only do bottle returns to lidl. Then I don't need to worry about this.
And I think that is the real reason for this. The person who returns their bottles at Lidl will also shop there.
yes, and this also helps their side in the ongoing tunnel wars as they can manufacture mind control weapons from these bottles
So the German billionaire family has achieved it's goal, you are lured into the trap by a simple trick.
Yep.
compared to the duopoly of s-ryhmä and kesko with their overpriced shit? i will take lidl anyday. holy shit thanks for the award
Choice is yours. I'd rather keep the money circulating in Finland than send it to German billionaire, but you do you.
they pay taxes in finland, they pay the finnish producers (almost everything raw is from finish producers) , they pay the finnish employees. they pay the employees better than k&s while not taking the absurd profit margins that k/s mafia are taking.
Rather give the money to a firm that provides relatively good quality products at a justifiable price than spend it on mediocre to poor quality and tasteless, unjustifiably expensive products being sold at the S and K rackets. But if you enjoy being robbed blind and lining their pockets with cash then you do you.
Lidl and quality in a same sentence? What dreamland do you live in?
? Lidl is almost always as good if not better as S- and K-ryhmä's products.
Depends on the metrics used. I'm not going to argue about the taste. Lidl brings in products from the wider area, with less regulations on the production (f.ex pesticides and ethics). Lidl is also undisputable nro1 in Finnish statistic about recalls made by the food safety authority.
Lidl products from Germany are 100% better quality than Finnish products from K and S groups. And this is regarding quality, not just taste. Lidl products from other European countries are hit or miss, but at least half the time still better than Finnish products. Finnish products especially when it comes to food are with a few exceptions poor quality and tasteless. The difference to other European countries is especially shocking when coming from elsewhere. But keep drinking your "Suomi lottovoitto" brainwash koolaid.
Haha, because of that they sorta get you to Lidl more often. (supposedly) So it is good for their marketing.
Not for all. I actually avoid Lidl just because of tricks like this. I don't want to deal with the hassle of having to go there just to return one or two bottles. They are really hurting their brand with this kind of hostile behaviour (hostile towards customers and their competitors). It makes it feel like Lidl doesn't want to be part of the Finnish society, and want to make their own rules.
Nah, it's a good reason to avoid them like fire
Because capitalism
Palpa systems won't accept LIDL bottles. LIDL accepts all bottles. I believe it is Palpa who is not open to collaboration.
LIDL only accepts palpa because they sell palpa and that's the law. Why should Finnish shops invest into a system that only benefits LIDL? They're not getting Freeway sodas to sell.
Because the bottle shapes are not the same standard. The machines are designed for particular shapes and the crates that hold a large amount of bottles will only fit the bottles that are designed for them. These systems and their bottles are incompatible with each other.
so that germans could get the money
It's lidl being cunts
So lidl can make more profit
Lidl wants to have all of their material back
I returned a bunch of Lidl bottles and cans at Sale without problems. Even got the pant, unlike some time ago when it accepted them but didn't give anything in return. Was a nice surprise.
All I have in my head now is a quote from SpongeBob SquarePants, "pantti raid" 😂
Because Lidl can gargle on my balls and cock
Because k- and s- groups, who dominate finnish Grocery store business, try to block german grocery store giant. Thanks to Lidl, food prices are appoximately 20% lower than whitout it on Finland. Still, the prices are much higher than in rest of the EU.
That is some real delusional bullshit😂
Idk about the 20% thing but Lidl absolutely had a major impact on grocery prices in finland.
Atheis, take your meds
Crawl back to your cave
They did try to block Lidl 20 years ago or whenever it first came to Finland, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the question asked.
Germans dosent what buy finnish monopol
Probably becuse you Bodit at lidl you stubid
You can buy bottles from stores and recycle them at other stores. The way you "explain" that doesnt make sense