I found a restaurant willing to give me their bottles, and they say they have 1200 available every weekend. I think they dump it otherwise. I could basically get 1200 bottles every week indefinitely if I wanted to, but that would be ridiculous because I wouldn't know what to do with them. Ideas? I'm talking about beer bottles by the way, not sure what kind of beer but probably bud light or something.
what to do with excessive bottles
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Can you refermant in that type of bottles?
I know the USA brewers almost only use kegs and taps, while over here it is almost the opposit.
I think I have about 30 to 40 crates (24 bottles each crate) plus 40 champagne bottles.
If I would be able to get 1000 bottles in one time, I would be glad
If they hyave that amount every weekend, chanses are the bottles are quite clean
I know the USA brewers almost only use kegs and taps, while over here it is almost the opposit.
I think I have about 30 to 40 crates (24 bottles each crate) plus 40 champagne bottles.
If I would be able to get 1000 bottles in one time, I would be glad
If they hyave that amount every weekend, chanses are the bottles are quite clean 
bottlebomber
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I'd get pretty picky at that level. I would definitely want any good heavy champagne bottles, and 22's, but only the nicest 12's - anchor steam, Sierra nevada, etc. I wouldn't take any twist offs.
McGlothan
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I hope by "dump" you mean "recycle". Otherwise, that place is burying us all alive!
bobbrewedit
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My understanding is the twist off bottles don't seal right when you try to reuse them...might be worth steering clear of them.
I dont think they recycle, haha. Oh well?
But I guess I would have to sort them out when I get home. No twist offs basically. I'm really glad I have access to free bottles though because my LHBS are selling them for around a dollar each I think. That's pretty pricey.
But I guess I would have to sort them out when I get home. No twist offs basically. I'm really glad I have access to free bottles though because my LHBS are selling them for around a dollar each I think. That's pretty pricey.
bottlebomber
Well-Known Member
Shoot, if they don't recycle you need to start doing it... 1/2 hr of sorting glass will pay for your brewing habit.
Not everywhere has a deposit system like CA or MI.
Sounds like you could setup a nice side business selling bottles out of a truck in the parking lot of the LHBS for $0.50 each....
janson745
Well-Known Member
The down-side to living in Michigan is that the bars to not want to do this for us. They get 10 cents return on each, so to them, its like giving away money. So I have been hitting up friends and family, which yeilds only about 12-24 bottles per...
There is a bill to introduce a bottle deposit of 5/10 cents in TX in 2013. It's a gamble that it passes, but if he has places to store them it's a minimum of $60 each weekend should the bill pass.
If nothing else cherry pick the bottles you want and take the rest to a recycler, the planet will thank you.
Oddly, many bars don't recycle. I think its because the city doesn't pay for it (the rrcycling pickup) and it gives the bars one more thing to keep track of. I've talked with a friend who owns a bar. Its a catch 22 - they go through so many bottles it becomes a chore to recycle, but its because they go through such a high volume of bottles that its important to recycle.
Erroneous
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You'd probably be surprised how many businesses don't recycle. It's really sad but I'm sure if more states offered deposits on bottles and effectively advertised it more bars and restaurants would do it. I know for instance when I needed bottles the couple of bars I asked to save me bottles both said they just dump them, and one of them serves nothing but beer wine and cigars.
Can someone enlighten me on how this system works in USA?
Here in The Neterlands they sell all beer in bottles in a plastic crate:
That's 24 bottles of 33 centiliters in a crate. Each bottle is 10 cents deposit, an empty crate is 1,50
So far a empty crate with empty bottles you get 3,90 deposit back.
With a little effort you can 'buy' those returned crates from the local supermarket for the same deposit.
The bottles are great quality and you can use them without problems for refermantation on the bottle.
So empty bottles and crates never are an issue here in NL.
Here in The Neterlands they sell all beer in bottles in a plastic crate:
That's 24 bottles of 33 centiliters in a crate. Each bottle is 10 cents deposit, an empty crate is 1,50
So far a empty crate with empty bottles you get 3,90 deposit back.
With a little effort you can 'buy' those returned crates from the local supermarket for the same deposit.
The bottles are great quality and you can use them without problems for refermantation on the bottle.
So empty bottles and crates never are an issue here in NL.
boscobeans
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Each State is different. Some have deposits and some don't.
I got all mine from a local beer distributer for $1.40 per case of 24 twelve ounce Sam Adams bottles.
New York has a five cent deposit per bottle.
bosco
bobbrewedit
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I enjoy emptying the bottles myself...isn't that the fun part!?!?
LandoLincoln
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Sure thing.
Most of the bottles here in the United States are twist-offs, because Americans lost too many teeth trying to get the pop-tops off.
Most Americans do not recycle their bottles - they prefer to use them as target practice.
The bottles that do get recycled aren't really recycled either - they are used for target practice by the local police and fire departments. Yes, our firemen have guns just like the police do.
jsv1204
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bobbrewedit said:
I am with Bob - half the fun of bottle collecting is emptying!
We have no deposit or deposit recovery in our state. I normally buy case quantities (24) in a corrugated carton, drink 'em, and then reuse the bottles (no twist off caps) and the corrugated cartons. Plastic crates would be heavenly! I have a few old Sam Adams boxes that are feeling their age...
KISS Brew said:
No, but other places give refunds based in volume...
You know what, if I hoard all the bottles that the restaurant was gonna dump anyway, I could potentially get back 3k a year, assuming the bottle deposit bill gets passed.
If it doesn't, maybe I could drive to the nearest bottle deposit to Houston, although that might be too far to be worth it. Plus, one year's worth of bottles would be 62400 bottles and I doubt the 2 pick up trucks we have would be able to handle that.
I called a local bar here in Kentucky that sells only craft beer do they're all pry off bottles. I asked them to save them for me and they said yes. A week later I called to see if I could pick them up and how many they had. They got pretty mean and said they only have three bottles in the case because they really don't have time to mess with it. Uppity bastards.
boscobeans
Well-Known Member
When I owned a bar (about 20 years ago) we paid a deposit on each bottle we bought from the distributer. When the next order was delivered we would get a credit for all the empties.
It's a real PIA to store case after case of empties, as well as trying to keep them from being nests for fruit flies and other critters while they sat around taking up space. Storing a weeks worth of empties with no deposit value would not have made any sense to me.
I would have much rather thrown them in the dumpster each night and be done with it.
Maybe you could go there towards the end of the day and ask to take a few cases off their hands for a couple of bucks a case.
Only an idea.
bosco
Yeah you would have to pick em up each night. I don't think any bar/restaurant will hold on to bottles. They throw em out every night. The restaurant that I talked to sells 1200ish beers on friday, saturday, and sunday, according to them, and that means they have a few hundred bottles every night and nobody is gonna just leave that sitting around taking up space. I think I'm supposed to pick em up each night if I wanted them.
And I've thought more about the bottle deposit, Michigan is the only one that refunds 10 cents for a beer bottle. That makes 1200 bottle $120 a week and if I hoarded a year's worth that would be roughly $6000. But like I said, a year's worth of bottle would be roughly 60000 bottles and I'm not sure how much weight and space they would take up. Not only that but Michigan is like 1200 miles away from me. That or I can wait and see if the Texas deposit law passes.
oh well just brainstorming here.
And I've thought more about the bottle deposit, Michigan is the only one that refunds 10 cents for a beer bottle. That makes 1200 bottle $120 a week and if I hoarded a year's worth that would be roughly $6000. But like I said, a year's worth of bottle would be roughly 60000 bottles and I'm not sure how much weight and space they would take up. Not only that but Michigan is like 1200 miles away from me. That or I can wait and see if the Texas deposit law passes.
oh well just brainstorming here.
LandoLincoln
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Maybe, if you get a mail truck...
Chamuco
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The possibilities are endless....
d_striker
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We have to pay to recycle where I live. In the end, it's cheaper for restaurants to just throw everything away rather than recycle glass. The only restaurants that recycle here do so because they have an environmental conscience.
crushingblackdoom
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d_striker said:
Dang. They pay us to recycle in Portland, Oregon. It's great cuz there's always money laying around, provided there's a bar code on the label. Just ask the HomeBums lurking around! Sad tho, how resistant some counties and states are to recycling/sustainability/thinking about our kids in the next life... Even the restaurants here HAFTA recycle/compost or else! It's crazy & awesome. Most of the time....within reason.
ajlee
Well-Known Member
Jukas said:
I would think if the bill passes it wouldn't apply to bottles from before the bill passed. Here in MI you pay the deposit that becomes your refund up front when you buy the beer, and no one would have paid in for these bottles. The new labels would say there was a deposit and the old labels would not.
Any restaurant that is going to dedicate the time, energy, and space to saving the bottles is also returning them for deposit. Not to say they wouldn't sell you for deposit or just give you a case, but the pipedreams of some of you to ask a restaurant to set aside thousands of bottles for you to return is just not logical. Not to mention the servers will have little interest in saving you a bottle for your beer. Worst yet, is the servers I worked with didn't even care enough to set the bottle aside for me so I could return it to them full of delicious homebrew.
No, we already discussed this. Expecting a restaurant/bar to hold onto a massive pile of bottles is unreasonable since it would be a big hassle and take up too much space. That's why you go there on a busy night and take it off their hands right before they throw them out.
And actually I don't think I would be able to take bottles from texas and deposit them in another state. I think these bottles are marked for deposit by state and I think ajlee is right so that wouldn't work either.
But hey, I'm glad to know that I can have free bottles for my homebrews and if I wanted to take up any crazy hobbies that involved a lot of bottles I could do that.
Yes, that's what I do - go to the pub, ask a server I 'm friendly with to save some bottles and take them home with me that night. I also share my handmade beer with those servers.
I think I bit off more than I can chew. This right here is only a few hundred bottles, and only from a friday night.
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Good thing is most of them aren't twist offs except the bud lights. Can you even imagine 60000 bottles? Can't believe I even thought about moving that kind of numbers.
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Good thing is most of them aren't twist offs except the bud lights. Can you even imagine 60000 bottles? Can't believe I even thought about moving that kind of numbers.
bottlebomber
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Your wife is gonna be piiiisssed...
ajlee
Well-Known Member
Could start selling to home brewers on ebay, CL, or the HBT classifieds.
I was wrong about most of them not being twist-offs. I think something like 50-60% of the bottles were bud light, which were twist-offs. I had to pick out all the ones that weren't and throw out or recycle the twist offs. There were coronas, dos equis, and various mexican beers that i'm not too familiar with. All in all, I think I still came out with a few hundred bottles. This is plenty so I've told the restaurant I don't need anymore (lol)
So the next challenge is to remove the bottle labels. I did some reading and seems like plastic-glued on labels are fairly easy to remove with a soak of star-san, oxyclean and various other cleaners. Painted on labels like coronas appear to be much tougher but some say that a 30 minute soak in CLR will do the trick.
I'm not sure if I have to give them all a quick rinse to get rid of beer residue before I soak them...
After the labels are removed I will have to sanitize them. I'll have to think about how to do that later.
So the next challenge is to remove the bottle labels. I did some reading and seems like plastic-glued on labels are fairly easy to remove with a soak of star-san, oxyclean and various other cleaners. Painted on labels like coronas appear to be much tougher but some say that a 30 minute soak in CLR will do the trick.
I'm not sure if I have to give them all a quick rinse to get rid of beer residue before I soak them...
After the labels are removed I will have to sanitize them. I'll have to think about how to do that later.
boscobeans
Well-Known Member
Wash them out with hot water and visually check for crap like mold, cigarette butts etc.
Let them drain and dry until you want to remove labels. Some oxy from the next step will also clean them on the inside.
Oxy in hot water...Overnight soak and then a quick rub with a scrubby sponge and they are clean.. Painted labels..I leave them as is.
RINSE WELL with hot water. Store you clean bottles in a clean dust free place..Covered..
Quick spray with StarSan (vinator) and fill em with beer.
bosco
Let them drain and dry until you want to remove labels. Some oxy from the next step will also clean them on the inside.
Oxy in hot water...Overnight soak and then a quick rub with a scrubby sponge and they are clean.. Painted labels..I leave them as is.
RINSE WELL with hot water. Store you clean bottles in a clean dust free place..Covered..
Quick spray with StarSan (vinator) and fill em with beer.
bosco
Clearwater picks up my recycling bin every Monday. I pay for it. They don't take glass, only newspapers, aluminum and plastic.
bobbrewedit
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boscobeans said:
This is how I would do it also...hot water rinse, inspect for crap, soak in PBW overnight, bottle brush and rinse...then sanitize with Idophor just before you fill em.
Yes. I don't see the point in going to the trouble of trying to remove those, nor others that are darned near impossible to get off. Sure you're not going to use them for gifts or taking out of the house, etc. But you're surely going to have plenty of others for that.
I'm envious of the OP's bottle source, for sure. All the local places in my neck of the woods serve twist offs almost exclusively. I got a bunch off Craigs List, and had to drive an hour for those.
