GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

26-07-2003, 12:12 AM

In article ,
says...
Any super market that spends several hundreds of pounds in what is
essentially a wire box on wheels deserves to loose a few

I'll skip the tpo, although the image it conjures up is *interesting*.

Since the supermarket owns the trolley it would be theft to remove one
from their property. It sound horribly as though you are advocating
theft. If it should be plain to someone that picking up a few seeds that
are lying around on a hillside in a woodland that they are stealing then
it should be blindingly obvious that a manufactured and large item such
as a shopping trolley has an owner (especially since that owner's
company name is usually in plain view on it). Of course you couldn't be
advocating theft such as that could you?

They have spend a lot of money on them. They need to be built to take
heavy loads and give a smooth and quiet push for the customer. Lots of
design work has gone into those things over the years trying to develop
them so they don't get wobbly wheels after a few months of abuse and
don't end up turning left constantly.

The supermarkets are aware that while price is a factor, they *will*
lose customers for silly things like too many wobbly trolleys. That they
spend so much on bearings and design has led them to try any number of
means of retaining their property. The initial attempt of making you put
a quid deposit in the trolley was unpopular with many and is
disappearing slowly. The new trolleys are more expensive since the
wheels became a little more high tech and when you cross the boundary of
many of the supermarket sites, a brake mechanism engages.

These new trolleys have their own problems in that sometimes they'll be
scooped up by the low-wage trolley collectors with their electric
trolley pushing machines and forced across the entire carpark,
developing a flat spot on the braked wheel.

Warwick