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What To Do With Old Shopping Carts After Ordering New Ones?

Thursday, September 1, 2022 1:16 PM

What To Do With Old Shopping Carts After Ordering New Ones?

You’re bound to come across abandoned shopping carts no matter where you go. Under an underpass, by a grocery store outside the parking lot corral, or even just on the side of the street. But what if you’re a grocery store? How do you dispose of your shopping carts responsibly? It’s irresponsible to leave them lying around, push them outside the store, and abandon them. Do you know what to do with them next? This can be a difficult problem to grapple with. Sometimes you have to get creative. You can do many different things with old shopping carts after ordering new ones, and we’ll go over each idea below.

Why Dispose of Them?

There are a ton of reasons why you might want to dispose of your shopping carts. They could become a hazard to your customers’ safety, you could be rebranding, or your current carts could no longer reflect your store’s identity. That final point is particularly important because you should always stay true to your brand. If your carts don’t reflect your brand, say by being a different color than your new logo, it’s time to get new carts. 

How Can You Dispose of Them?

There are several ways to dispose of old shopping carts. You can donate them, send them to a scrapyard, sell them, or recycle them. These methods are all valid and should be utilized to your greatest capacity. If you want to be a responsible entrepreneur, this is an amazing way to go about it. It shows that your store is respectful and organized. Let’s get into the details of how to dispose of old shopping carts when you get new ones.

Donate Them

It’s important to remember that other people may find more use for your old carts than you do. If you decide to get rid of them, why not give them to someone who needs them? Some parties may be interested in buying your old carts in certain scenarios. If you can’t find a place to take the carts off your hands, handing them off to people who need them might be a good next step. Industrial artists who use scraps might be a good choice in this regard. Another option is donating them to the Salvation Army or Goodwill. Regardless, the idea is to keep them off the streets and to find them a new home instead. As always, check your state’s regulations beforehand as legal restrictions can apply.  

Scrap Them

You don’t want to keep carts around that have outlived their usefulness, and if the carts are not functional, you can’t exactly sell them to the highest bidder in the grocery store circuit. That said, something has to be done about broken carts. A good way to get rid of them is to scrap them. You can send old carts to the scrapyard to be repurposed. Several services will accept defective items and break them down to be reused later. This way, you do not have to worry about your carts ending up in a landfill.

Scrap Regulations

Scrapping your old or useless carts is a great way to dispose of your old fleet. We have to add a few caveats though. So many carts are stolen per year that many scrapyards will not accept them because of the potential legal battles they can face. All you need to do is show proof of purchase or a receipt. Note that some carts are made of restricted materials that you can’t sell to scrap yards. Different states have different laws, so if you are going to scrap your old carts, check your city and state regulations beforehand to ensure your lawfulness.

Sell Them

If the carts are in good shape, it might be wise to sell them. You can sell old carts to certain manufacturers who will refurbish them and then resell them on the market. Or you can sell them to smaller stores that need few single or two-tier shopping carts. These stores often do not need a fleet and want to save money, so there is a significant opportunity there to make a difference. Multi-location businesses often have a transfer system where one store can trade in its old stock to another. If your store happens to be in a chain, you can also take advantage of that. Selling is also a great way of refurbishing or recycling. We’ll get to that in the next segment.

Recycle Them

Let’s face it: landfills are terrible. Unfortunately, that is exactly where our unwanted baskets and shopping carts end up. A more environmentally inclined individual might recycle their old shopping carts for free. Some manufacturers make new shopping baskets from recycled materials here in the U.S. These baskets never end up in garbage dumps. All the materials are used exactly the way they need to be, and waste is no longer a problem.

Repurpose Them

You could always give your carts away to creatives and businesses who want old and unwanted carts. Carts can be used for art installations or reworked into a sculpture. They can also be built around an architectural structure. Certain people will beautify your carts in various ways. Some places can even make furniture out of carts. The possibilities are endless, and repurposing carts is a great way to help the environment and reduce wastefulness.

In short, there are many ways to dispose of your old carts. It’s just a matter of picking which option is right for you. One thing is for certain. You can’t just leave them out in the middle of a street or allow your carts to be stolen or abandoned. That would be a waste of resources and irresponsible toward the environment. If you are interested in purchasing shopping carts for your store, check out our carts at Carriage Trade Services. At Carriage Trade, we boast the best refurbished or brand-new carts on the market today. We hope this article has given you some useful information and would love to help you with your shopping cart needs.

What To Do With Old Shopping Carts After Ordering New Ones?

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