Dumpster Divers' Character Profile, Please?!!

[Carl]

Almost nightly but most definitely the night before our dumpster is weekly emptied out, we have "dumpster divers" who through their own volition climb into the dumpster to sift through all that garbage taking w/ them anything they find "valuable?" When I catch them on site I tell them what they are doing is SO DANGEROUS to themselves because there can be sharp objects inside, and I CANNOT ALLOW THIS & YOU MUST LEAVE NOW! These people are for the most part polite, respectful enough to quickly leave, they make up some "fib" about how they lost something and are just trying to find it...We recently, I kid you not, had a man in a wheelchair ride on up to the dumpster and even w/ a prosthetic leg managed to climb his way INTO the dumpster to do as described in the above?

What drives these people? Can you share w/ us what seems to make this an "addiction" for these people? What's your relationship w/ them...do you see/know the "regulars" who do this? How do you treat them? What do you say to them? Do you threaten them w/ a potential police call or are you on a first name basis w/ some of them? (for my part I don't ever get "chummy" w/ them for fear that if they ever did get injured inside the dumpster somehow they would hold me responsible having somehow given them some kind of "wink & nod" that it's okay...I always stay firm and imply, "You cannot be doing this & have to leave!")

It just baffles me how anyone would want to get inside w/ all that trash but apparently there are websites on the Internet actually bragging about diving into dumpsters even giving tips to readers who want to give it a try sometime? My staff and I just DO NOT GET IT AT ALL...is there really anything so wonderful to find amidst all that weekly build-up of trash? I'll bet some of the replies we read here will reveal what is behind these people's obsession and it's going to be a fascinating thread! ?LOL!!??

All the best in 2019...thanks, all! ~ Carl

 

[MEP001]

I used to work with a guy who was obsessed with coming up with a way to sift through the mud in the pits to get any quarters that people dropped that rolled into the pit. I tried to explain to him how hard it was going to be to sift through NINE BAYS of mud each about two cubic yards, how any coins he did find were going to be corroded beyond any value, and how few realistically end up in the pits to begin with. I asked him why not take a part time job somewhere a couple hours once or twice a week rather than bother with all that? He couldn't even answer. All I can tell you is that the perceived value of "found money" was worth much more to him than some honest work for some cash pay. When it came to this he was delusional, unreasonable, and irrational, but otherwise he was normal and above average intelligence.

I would suggest calling the police and have them issue a criminal trespass warrant. You want to prove you're doing everything you can to prevent these people from coming to harm on your property. Years ago a local operator had an elderly employee die on his site - the steel dumpster lid was supposed to have a safety prop that engaged itself when it was opened, but it was broken so he was propping it open with a piece of 2x4. He bumped it dumping a can, the lid came down on his head, and he fell and hit his head on the concrete. The operator was smart enough that he had called and made dated notation that he reported the broken lid to the dumpster company, so he wasn't involved in the law suit.

 

[chaz]

My dumpster is behind a locked cage. So any divers would need to climb the fence. Obviously if someone wants in...they’ll get in...though I’ve never seen or witnessed divers at my location. I do have “regulars” that dig through my trash barrels. I try to discourage this...and if I catch someone sorting stuff to the ground and leaving the barrel out of place or disrupting business i invite them to stay away.

 

[PaulLovesJamie]

I think its just part of human nature - one mans trash is another mans treasure, found treasure definitely has a unique allure.

And now for a confession...
No I dont dumpster dive, but I do get a perverse pleasure (as well as some great party conversation) out of selling stuff that was left in my trash on ebay. I dont root around for it, but when its on top and obvious I cant resist. I dont waste my time unless I think I can get $25 or more, ideally more than $50. A few examples:
- almost new sneakers that have dog crap on them. Believe it or not, 3 times over a 2 or 3 year period, more than $50 each time.
- the kitchen sink (literally, a stainless steel sink, lol)
- 3 hefty bags full of laundered towels and sheets
- laptops
- assorted tools
- foreign coins & bills
- weightlifting weights, 300 lbs.
- etc
Yes, of course I hang on to items in the lost&found for a few weeks before they go.

And to illustrate that EVERYTHING has value to somebody (and to prove beyond question that I have a warped sense of humor), I sold a box of chicken sh**. (I raise chickens, so I have plenty of it.)

"What do you do for a living?"
"I sell chicken sh** on ebay."
LOL

 

[chaz]

A friend’s business is cleaning out (for a fee) foreclosed or otherwise abandoned houses. Part of the deal he gets all stuff inside. Mostly trash, but he does get cash for scrap metal etc. at one cleanout there was an initial effort to bag stuff for disposal/transport. Upon searching those bags he found a complete service of silver flatware. Big bucks!

 

[soapy]

I had a very old guy show up about 20 years ago who liked to show up and go through our garbage cans and collect metal etc. He also liked to open the vacuums to collect the coins. I finally have him a key to vacs so he could clean them a couple times of month. I usually would not allow this but I found out that he was a scientist working on the Manhattan project back in WW2. I love our vets so I let him do this for years until he passed away. He did not need it for money just a compulsion he had.

 

[OurTown]

We lock our dumpster so we do not get the divers but we do get the can pickers. One of the common traits is that they never drive a car there. Sometimes I think they are looking for food which is sad.

 

[Carl]

Thanks for the interesting replies! It really does seem like a sort of compulsion or thrill for them kind of like those guys you see on the beach w/ a metal detector looking for lost metal items that could be valuable? What a tragic story about the death of the employee from the dumpster lid falling upon him...oh gosh that really helps me realize I do need to discourage and document and deter these people w/ calls to the police if I have to so that I build a "paper trail" of someone trying to keep even these trespassers from harm. Thanks!

 

[Randy]

For the last 25 years we’ve never had to lock down our dumpsters. In last few years we’ve had a large increase in the number of homeless people in our community. They come mostly at night and on bicycles, climb over the dumpster fence, pry open the dumpster lids and pull out the garbage, they look like badgers digging a hole with the garbage flying. We’ve had the beef up the security on the dumpsters to the point that the dumpster security is almost as good as some equipment room doors. We’ve also had to lock down the lids on the garbage cans by the vac islands. What they are primarily looking for is personal information that they can use for identity theft, people throwaway some really personal information, social security numbers, banking information etc. A couple of months ago while I was waiting for the garbage truck to come, sometimes we have so much garbage we can’t get it into the dumpster, I caught a guy digging in the dumpster, again he looked like a badger digging a hole, papers, cans going everywhere. When I asked him he said he was looking for cigarette butts. When told him to get out here he started mouthing off and came at me in a treating manner, it got pretty ugly from there.

 

[OurTown]

When I asked him he said he was looking for cigarette butts.

I forgot to mention that in our earlier post that a few months ago we had to screw the tops to the bottoms of the smoker's outpost receptacles because they were messed with every day.

 

[Carl]

Thanks for the additional, informative replies! So it's 10:51 pm and I was about ready for bed. I log into my security cameras and see a suspicious car in the vacuuming area so I look for activity from my other cameras and then I see a suspicious person on foot around the auto cashier area so I jump in my car and head on over there wanting to stop someone breaking equipment like maybe a bill acceptor or the bill changer. The guy sees me pull in so he jumps in his beat up car and drives hurriedly off. With a flashlight I inspect all validators, etc. and it turns out IT'S JUST ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE VACUUM BASIN DIGGERS / DUMPSTER DIVERS! I find no damage but am just annoyed that I see the cotter pins holding 6 of my regular vacs' lower doors pulled off indicating he was looking for coin in our vac basins. Dumpster lid was closed at 8:00 pm and it's open now so he dug around in there. The point of this story is to highlight how inconveniencing these guys can be when we mistake them for vandals but in the big picture; I honestly am happy that all these types do is "look for stuff" and they don't necessarily break stuff. The thing where my early morning customers might not have vacuum suction because of their leaving the lower doors open of the vacuums does tick me off but as compared to the jerks who will cut through a vacuum island to steal the coin vault...I'll take the cotter pin removal guy over the vandalism guy any day! But still...these guys are a weird breed and I don't think there's an easy way to stop them.

 

[Roz]

This goes hand in hand with all the bobby pins and dental floss sticks you probably find on the ground. Early on I could not understand why I would be cleaning up so many bobby pins and dental floss sticks on the ground until a teenager explained how to use them to turn on the vacs for free. Seems to work on the older style vacs with the mechanical coins acceptors (not the newer style vacs). The upgrade to our vacs seems to have curtailed the issue...

 

[mjwalsh]

We lock our dumpster so we do not get the divers but we do get the can pickers. One of the common traits is that they never drive a car there. Sometimes I think they are looking for food which is sad.

Just to add ... Waste Management provides our lock & it is set up so when they dump their equipment does not require an unlock process. The drawback is that when we dump our smaller barrels into it we need to unlock the lock. During cold weather there is less of a need for the lock we find. Summertime ... dead fish being thrown in etc makes it more of a necessity.

We have a 4 yard ... business has been less lately so we have been tempted to go smaller or more often than a once a week schedule. Eliminating too many smaller trash cans &/or barrels would not work for us like some have suggested.

 

[Carl]

Roz ~ Oh good grief...I've been 14+ years in this business and never realized all those bobby pins and dental floss sticks were part of people screwing me over to turn on vacs somehow?!! I don't really want you detailing it here because the bad guys will then learn as well so I'm gonna experiment and then probably have to replace all my vacs' coin acceptors if they're allowing this trick because I don't like people "stealing!" Thanks for the info and insight. (I always wondered to myself why so many of my customers use dental floss sticks instead of traditional dental floss reels and after reading your post I also recognized we have so many bobby pins on our vac area floor!...wow!)

 

[mjwalsh]

I remember there was "dumpster diver" in the middle of the day at our car wash a long time ago. A well intentioned "lady" police officer just happened to be driving by & stopped. She said to me that after talking to the young man ... that she did not want to discourage "recycling" ... I left it at that. I would assume that the judge would not hold me liable if the young man got injured because I did not approve of him jumping inside like that.