If you’re served a Coke at a cafe, should you get the 10¢ bottle refund?
By Danny Katz
When I go to a cafe and they serve me Coke in a bottle, is it OK for me to take the bottle home to get the 10¢ refund?
R.S., Rosanna, Vic
Credit: Illustration by Simon Letch
Getting a refund on a bottle of Coke used to be a complicated affair. You had to drive your bottle to the airport, catch a plane to South Australia, take a taxi to a refund depot, then present your bottle to a team of South Australian bottle-appraisers so they could make sure it was a proper, refundable bottle and not a Fruits of the Forest jam jar that you were trying to sneak through. Once your bottle was confirmed as refund-worthy, you’d be presented with a 5¢ coin on a velvet cushion, which would be followed by an official ceremony with dancing, chants and hats. Three hours later, you’d head back to your home town with your 5¢ coin, a total round-trip journey costing up to $3000, including airfares, taxis, parking, hat rental and a bottle of Coke you bought at the airport on the way home because getting refunds on bottles is tough, thirsty work.
But you’re lucky. You live in a Golden Age of Aussie Bottle Recycling: depots have popped up everywhere and the refund is now a whopping 10¢, so Australians from all states and territories can now splash around in those fizzy, over-sweetened, diabetic rivers of refund-gold. If you bought a bottle of Coke in a cafe, you own the Coke and you own the bottle it came in, so take that bottle to a nearby depot or participating retailer and get paid to reduce pollution. Unfortunately, there are no more three-hour ceremonies: it’s all become very drab and perfunctory, but wear a hat anyway, and maybe do a dance, just to honour the history, culture and tradition.
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