I used to put my bottles and cans curbside. Most of the folks picking them up are, I'm sure, as honest as I am or even more so. They just need another source

I used to put my bottles and cans curbside. Most of the folks picking them up are, I'm sure, as honest as I am or even more so. They just need another source of income. On the other hand, we and the neighbors have had things disappear. People have prowlers in their back yards "looking for cans". So it seemed like a good idea to stop setting them out or even having them visible. What I do now: you can buy bags and bar code labels for about $.10/pair. When a bag is full of recyclables, you tie it off, put your label on it, and drop it off at one of the BottleDrop centers. There's two kinds: one where they have people working there and one where they don't (the "Express" versions). At the Express places, they truck the bags to somewhere else where they're counted. They charge $.40/bag to count them. So for $.50, or 5 bottles, I can have someone else count them instead of standing on the sticky, stinky floor to shove in bottles one at a time. It's about 8-10%, assuming you can get 50-60 bottles and cans in a bag. There are also grocery stores where they let you drop off your empties and they count them and give the deposit to a specified charity.