people who toss their cigarette butts on sidewalk, from car windows, beaches, nature trails, etc, suck. world is not an ashtray. so maybe this'll reduce their littering if thay kept their butts for free cigarettes. sorry, no free cigs for non-filter smokers.
-- procrastinator, Mar 15 2001

(?) "Lawmaker advocates cigarette-butt deposit" http://www.centralm...10112bucksfor.shtml
Getting rid of butts via the deposit method... [dgeiser13, Mar 15 2001, last modified Oct 04 2004]

Five dollars a pack http://www.theawl.c...osts-state-by-state
or 10 dollars a pack for cigarettes. [popbottle, Dec 16 2015]

Not sure how this would operate or be funded, but I'd be all for it. I can't stand seeing people throw cigarette butts out of their car windows. Argh. I'm getting all upset just thinking about it.
-- PotatoStew, Mar 15 2001


I read about a law proposed somewhere in the New England area that would add a $1.00 tax to each pack, but the smokers could return the butts for $.05 per. Couldn't find a link, or the original story.
-- Fishead, Mar 15 2001


I'm not against smokers, though I do think cigarettes are disgusting. I just want people to stop throwing their butts out. maybe then, like Fishead mentioned, it's better to charge more for a pack of cigarettes, then give money back for butts returned?
-- procrastinator, Mar 15 2001


There's a fiscal problem caused by the large supply of legacy cigarette butts that would suddenly become (slightly) valuable. As well, the guys that pick through your recycling looking for deposit bottles and cans would start going through all of the trash. Given the level of care they usually apply, the streets would likely be filled with garbage, as though Hell's own army of raccoons had invaded.
-- td, Mar 15 2001


A friend of mine heard on the radio that Maine was considering making cigarette butts a deposit item. You'd pay an additional $1 for each pack, then return the butts for $0.05. The idea is that it will help keep the city cleaner, but I think there are two problems.

A) Who in their right mind would want to actually count the cigarette butts that were returned? Or even touch them?? It's not the same as returing a glass bottle.

B) Kids looking for money are going to go around collecting cigarette butts. While there isn't really a problem with this, I don't think the parents are going to be too happy about it.
-- pnewp, Mar 19 2001


Speaking as an ex convenience store person, I'd like to say there's -no- way I'm going to fondle somebody else's cig butts, and it's unlikely anybody else will for minimum wage, either.
-- StarChaser, Mar 20 2001


make them into jewelery
-- technobadger, Mar 20 2001


A one cent (or less) bounty on butts would take care of the bulk of the litter problem, and it would do so at a cost that is cheaper and more effective than a municipal contractor.

At that low a price it probably wouldn't offer enough incentive for bars and restaurants to cash in, but would provide a meagre income supplement for the truly desperate.

Imagine one bag lagy yelling at another: "Get your hand off my butt!"
-- FloridaManatee, Feb 14 2003


Maby you could wheigh the butts? The payment however will have to be low enough that it dose not pay to chop up cigerets and then return them.
-- my-nep, Nov 23 2003


/There's a fiscal problem caused by the large supply of legacy cigarette butts that would suddenly become (slightly) valuable./

Couldn't thye just print deposit info on the cigarette wrapper around the filter end like they print deposit info on bottles? Would solve that glitch...
-- WhiteDove01s, Jul 15 2004


fundamentally what do you do with the used butts . If there is a use then there's a value and a gravity away from the throw . Get the daleks and terminators to pick them up .
-- wjt, Aug 10 2007


[wjt] are you, by any chance, Treon under a different name?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 10 2007


Seems to me you could recycle the butts into new cigarettes. Say 20 % reclaimed tobacco and 80 % new tobacco.

Maybe provide/sell them to Alzheimer patients or homeless that either don't know or don't care where the the next nicotine hit is coming from. Some of the Goth types might smoke them just for the YUCK factor.

In 2001 a pack was a buck, now it is 5 or 10 bucks. See link.

Slightly off topic note: You know how Frank Sinatra and the Rat pack made smoking look so elegant ? They just put a few cigs in their suit jacket pockets and left the cumbersome packs in the hotel room. Things are what you believe them to be.
-- popbottle, Dec 16 2015


Great idea!
-- doctorremulac3, Dec 19 2015


Had thought of bogus street fag bins epoxyed onto some buildings, go empty them in the wee hours, thence recycle..
-- not_morrison_rm, Dec 22 2015



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