h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

you pay 2 pounds for a token to replace a 1 pound coin?

this is up there with pet rocks.

...usually when i've seen these tokens (i've got one) you pay a donation to whichever charity is offering them.........

this explains the need for the token no more than it would explain the need for a pet rock if the money went to charity. were the token the same value as the coin it replaced it would (almost) make sense; it is illegal after all to drill holes in coins.

what WOULD make sense is selling a keyring clip to hold one or more coins. now that i would buy.

and if anyone makes money from that idea let me know. i want my cut.

We had an old bloke in the car park of our local supermarket who would volunteer to take your trolley back to the storage area. he would then collect the $1 coin. He was probably making $50 to $100 a day. He got quite threatening if you didn't hand your trolley over to him (he was more than a little crazy). My wife refused to go to the supermarket on her own because of this. Eventually this supermarket abandoned the $1 deposit. I remember reading a news report here about 2~3 years ago where someone was killed after hitting an abandoned trolley at high speed, so they are killers (as well as a bloody irritant).

A token that could not be used for anything else sounds like a good idea: if it is worth more than the coin, it would discourage people abandoning (expletive deleted) trolleys all over the suburbs! I always have pockets full of coins but never the right one - arrrrrgghhh! - has to be a PhD thesis in that - but I always have my key ring.

I work in a sheetmetal factory and I could probably laser-cut 100 tokens the right size for $1 - maybe I have just found a new product line!!!

"I remember reading a news report here about 2~3 years ago where someone was killed after hitting an abandoned trolley at high speed, so they are killers"



Am I missing something here? "High speed"? Just how fast was the trolley moving at that point? I'm guessing zero mph.

What you're basically talking about here is a driver hitting a large, not inconspicuous, STATIONARY object at "high speed". You are then blaming the object, calling it a "killer". On that basis, trees are killers. Drivers hit them at high speed all the time. Let's burn down all the forests, just in case, huh?

SoRB

i can't see how this deters theft btw. altho it sure makes people return the trollies to the bay. as was mentioned earlier a coin value is hardly a deterrent to someone wanting to make away with one. and if you have one away from the supermarket you need only cut off the s shaped jack on the other side and you have your coin back anyway. but for keeping car parks clear they are a good idea whether tokens or coins are used.

my query is with the tokens costing more than the coin it replaces, which doesn't makes sense on any level. if you went to a laundromat and you had a choice of putting in a one pound coin or buying a replacement token for 2 pounds...would you do it? of course not. it's irrational.

BTW: the driver was travelling at a legal speed
'let's burn down all the forests'?? look up 'specious argument'

- and I forgot to mention, at night, making a wire framed shopping trolley, not particulary conspicuous.

a lot of the supermarkets i go to have trollys with a sensor type thing that jams the wheels at the edge of the carpark area, thus making it nigh-on impossible to steal the trolly.

seems to work.... although i'm sure where theres a will, theres a way...

"my query is with the tokens costing more than the coin it replaces, which doesn't makes sense on any level."

Given that one retains the token, it makes sense because the token has value other than that of currency. As a keepsake, as a collectors' item, or simply as something that looks cool and individual hanging from your keychain. I see plenty of people with things hanging from their keychain, things that probably cost more than two pounds, which don't even have an alternative function - they're purely decorative. This is why these things make sense.

As for the comments re: the killed driver:

1. I wasn't the one who used the phrase "high speed". I'm also struggling to imagine a scenario in which a responsibly driven car at almost any speed can be involved in a fatal collision with something as fragile as a shopping trolley.

2. The fact that it was at night is largely irrelevant. There are many inherently inconspicuous objects which may be on a road at night, things far more dangerous to the driver than a lightweight mesh box. Pedestrians, for instance. I say again, it is hard to conceive how a responsible driver could contrive a fatal encounter with a shopping trolley.

3. Re: "let's burn down all the forests". I suggest you read Chapter 33 of "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe" by Douglas Adams, founder of this site. You can do so here (and indeed do a search for the phrase "burn down alll the forests"). http://matt.injustice.net.nz/guide/book2/b2c33.php . When you've done that, look up "sense of humour".

SoRB

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Well, it doesn't take too much imagination to picture said shopping trolley smashing through a windscreen and leaving someone with more than just a nasty bump....
...And i think your're right. It wouldn't have been driven responsibly....

by value i meant utility. i appreciate that a theory of value is wider than this. clearly there is a value outside of the shopping trolley equation otherwise the things wouldn't exist.

one retains the coin as well (unless you spend it on a token) which clearly has utility (fungibility) beyond that of the token, the future value of which is merely assumed.

and if the intention is to treat them as collectibles, and i agree, this might be rational, one would, presumably, not be using them for their intended purpose: hence there is an inevitable discordance between their intended use and their actual use. a person after all only needs ONE of these tokens.

this is fine. but the entry references their usefulness, which is what i am questioning. i enjoyed the entry btw.

The real value in trolley tokens is that you can't spend them on an stupidly worthless impulse buy (say, a 500ml bottle of popular carbonated vegetable-based beverage) and then realise that you have to either do without the trolley at the supermarket, or make yourself immensely unpopular by pushing into the checkout queue and asking the operator for change - and that's IF you have change.

I love my trolley token, it's indispensible to me, unlike a pound, which is all too easy to dispense of, if you ask me.

my query to the rationality of paying more for the tokens than the coin it replaces.

as for the alternative of spending it on an impulse buy: bottled water or trolley token, either way you are a pound plus (or whatever your local currency is) poorer. if you use an actual coin you have spent nothing.

i think folks lose the logic because the sums involved are relatively small. if we amplify the numbers the principle becomes self evident.

let us say you have to swipe your credit card to use a trolley. (and i wouldn't be suprised if this happens in the future) and the value of the trolley, a couple of hundred dollars/pounds is debited if it isn't returned. would you still think purchasing a non refundable 200 pound token was a logical substitute?

i understand and accept both the charity and collectability arguments even tho neither are reasons that would motivate me. but utility? on that level it is irrational.

i seem to have lost a verb back there.

my query referred to...

The *point* is once you've got the token, you will always be guaranteed to have it about your person, because it's unspendable. This feature is its utility advantage over a coin. Admittedly it's only of utility to people with no impulse control...

SoRB

you are 'guaranteed' no such thing. 'unspendable' doesn't reduce to always being available. (your argument btw would also justify paying $25 for a $20 gift voucher. think about it.) and if you are going shopping you have money. what you might not have is the particular coin required. worst case scenario is you make change with someone who is returning a trolley. or heaven forbid, ask the guy SELLING the tokens to help you make change. both are guaranteed to have the appropriate coin and you won't have to queue.

ftr i have a plastic token that was GIVEN to me as a courtesy by the supermarket when they first introduced these trolleys and which i keep in my car. i know from experience that i am no more likely to remember to take the token into the shop than i am to have coinage. the idea that the token is inherently more 'rememberable' than a coin just doesn't cut it.

as i said earlier, what would be rational is for charities to sell clips which hold a coin on your keyring.

by all means buy these things as novelties/collectibles or as a way of being charitable.

i'm done. *S*

I was in Sainsburys, Hazel Grove, Stockport, the other evening (Dec 2014). you would not believe how an unattended trolley can bowl around a car-park in a high winter wind. Especially the not-anecdotal One With The Wonky Wheel (there's always at least one) which will move unpredictably and tack around at crazy angles. I saw one blown around in the wind bouncing off at least three cars. I guess this gives the car owners a potential damages case against Sainsburys for any chips, scratches or other damage: their negligence in not patrolling the car park and rounding up strays. And this rogue trolley hit one car hard enough to set off its alarm. You wouldn't think it, but in high winds, you have to tie the things down somehow. And imagine it bowling in front of a moving car or escaping onto the A6 - one of the busiest roads in South Manchester...