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[Earthstrike]

There's a bakery near my house that doesn't care if you get bread out of their dumpsters, day or night. I was there once when two guys were actually inside the dumpster at 2pm and the employees were walking out and throwing stuff into the dumpster knowing full-well the guys were inside. Since the bakery delivers city-wide, I guess they consider giving back to our neighborhood, since I hear it's a pretty common thing for most of our neighborhood to go there for bread occasionally.

The grocery stores you should hit up about an hour after closing... The store I go to most frequently closes at 9pm and the employees have all the trash out by 10pm. We try to get there right at 10pm so other divers don't get the good stuff before us. The employees know about it and they don't do anything to stop us like calling the police or putting a lock on the dumpster.

We each have special clothes we wear so we don't get our regular clothes dirty. We also wear gloves and headlamps. Most of the stuff we take is packaged, such as cereal, canned soup or pasta. Most of the stuff doesn't have anything wrong with it, except maybe a tear in the corner of the package.

The produce we only take if it looks just as clean as if it were on the shelf and it's in a clean bag. Before we eat it, we make sure to scrub it real well and look for any rotten parts.

Most of the stuff that is thrown out is nearing expiration date, which is why they throw it out. Have you ever eaten anything out of your fridge that's past its expiration date? Most of the stuff we find hasn't even passed its date yet...

Do you have any experiences with stores that are open 24/7?

 

[rykomatsu]

When I was in college, I found that a lot of people got rid of their furniture next to the dumpster, not inside the dumpster. I managed to get a sofa set, coffee table, end tables, and a few other things for free when people were moving in a rush. Spent a few hours disinfecting with lysol and cleaning with a few cleansing agents, but small price to pay for ~$500-1000 worth of furniture I would have considered buying new.

Since I'm picky with design, though, nowadays, I just buy new....

 

[cmonmanreally]

logical fallacy of freeganism: it is a social movement that (from i have read about it) acts against the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society, however, is fully dependent on the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society in order to sustain itself. okay so i get that it is supposed to be a statement and nothing else. still this solves nothing.

also, the friends and acquaintances that i know who do this are completely oblivious as to how or why the movement first started. now (again speaking from my own experience) its more of a do-it-for-the-sake-of-being-trendy type of thing.

 

[Dresden]

logical fallacy of freeganism: it is a social movement that (from i have read about it) acts against the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society, however, is fully dependent on the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society in order to sustain itself. okay so i get that it is supposed to be a statement and nothing else. still this solves nothing.

also, the friends and acquaintances that i know who do this are completely oblivious as to how or why the movement first started. now (again speaking from my own experience) its more of a do-it-for-the-sake-of-being-trendy type of thing.

Yeah. It's just cheap or poor people justifying their beggar-like existence with environmentalist rhetoric.

 

[WrathOfOtaibah]

logical fallacy of freeganism: it is a social movement that (from i have read about it) acts against the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society, however, is fully dependent on the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society in order to sustain itself. okay so i get that it is supposed to be a statement and nothing else. still this solves nothing.

also, the friends and acquaintances that i know who do this are completely oblivious as to how or why the movement first started. now (again speaking from my own experience) its more of a do-it-for-the-sake-of-being-trendy type of thing.

When you're rummaging through trash, you need to rely on a few various defense mechanisms.

 

[Commodore_Perry]

I wish that I had the nerve to dumpster dive. The thought of being in garbage freaks me out. :lol

After the first time it's not so bad... It's actually pretty exciting when you're knee deep in garbage bags and you come up with one that's full of something good.

The store we go to throws a lot of stuff out if it was in a box that had one broken package, ie. If it's a box full of jam and one of the jars broke open, they throw out the whole box because they're too lazy to clean the jam off the other jars. Those are the really awesome nights. I have several cans of this really healthy and delicious lentil soup because of that.

 

[ThatCrazyGuy]

Damn, this thread makes me want to go diving. One day....

 

[ZootedGranny]

A couple of years ago I helped my old man clean out his house, and we were throwing everything into a 20 cubic yard dumpster he had rented. Once we were done filling it, we went to get something to eat, and less than an hour later returned to find the dumpster nearly emptied.

 

[JBuccCP]

In an engineering class I took in high school we built our stuff almost exclusively from the dumpster outside. Shit always worked too.

fake edit: old ass thread

 

[squicken]

I still can't get over people eating food that was in the trash. Seinfeld covered this. We all agreed on it.

 

[Tarazet]

Hey, why can't I claim all those unclaimed Treasury bonds, too? They're just rotting in some account, ripe for the picking!

 

[PhoncipleBone]

logical fallacy of freeganism: it is a social movement that (from i have read about it) acts against the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society, however, is fully dependent on the wasteful-ness of a capitalist society in order to sustain itself. okay so i get that it is supposed to be a statement and nothing else. still this solves nothing..

Exactly. They are rebelling against the one thing that they rely on to sustain themselves. It does seem to be pointless. Now if it was a group of people that lived off the land and sustained themselves without buying anything other than the means to start a self sustaining habitat for themselves, then that would solve things and be impressive.

 

[Seth C]

Exactly. They are rebelling against the one thing that they rely on to sustain themselves. It does seem to be pointless. Now if it was a group of people that lived off the land and sustained themselves without buying anything other than the means to start a self sustaining habitat for themselves, then that would solve things and be impressive.

Yes, but they are surviving and using the waste products of society. Yes, if society wasn't wasteful they couldn't live, but then...they wouldn't have to worry about us being so wasteful then either, would they?

 

[Commodore_Perry]

I'm going diving right now... Be back in about an hour. I'll let ya'll know what I come up with!

 

[Commodore_Perry]

My load for the evening:

A 5lb bag of yams (One bruised and mushy yam)
A bag of lemons (one bruised and mushy lemon)
A bag of medium onions (one was twin and "looked gross")
A 6 pack of tomatoes (3/6 were bruised and mushy)
A bag of almonds
A bag of fancy spaghetti
A block of fancy goat milk cheese, still cold
A package of chocolate covered almonds
Lavender salt scrub for the bath (was greasy, like one of the others in the box burst open on it)
A tub of organic protein supplement

I left a bunch of stuff behind too because I couldn't carry it.

 

[Tater Tot]

:lol nice feast there commodore

edit: I'm going tommorrow

 

[blame space]

Um.

Yes.

I want to do this.

 

[Night_Trekker]

It kinda pisses me off that someone actually named this "freeganism".

 

[PhoncipleBone]

It kinda pisses me off that someone actually named this "freeganism".

Gotta have a hip name for something to become trendy.

 

[Chony]

I can't believe I remember reading this thread a couple years ago.

 

[Timedog]

Yes, but they are surviving and using the waste products of society. Yes, if society wasn't wasteful they couldn't live, but then...they wouldn't have to worry about us being so wasteful then either, would they?

Some people have a hard time understanding this.

 

[Gouty]

I'm going diving right now... Be back in about an hour. I'll let ya'll know what I come up with!

So if and when you get back on your feet with a new job, do you plan to continue to dumpster dive?

 

[Ninja Scooter]

holy crap i made the same response to this thread 2 years apart. I need to quit NeoGaf.

 

[CabbageRed]

I am decidedly wasteful. If there is someone between me and the landfill, they have my thanks.

 

[Commodore_Perry]

So if and when you get back on your feet with a new job, do you plan to continue to dumpster dive?

I may occasionally, but probably not. There's quite a few people who do it and I'd be taking from them. I've met at least 2 different people every night that I've gone. There are a few regulars, but most people do it 1-2 times a week just to stock their pantry with useful stuff.