Can I buy Tabs?
Tab trivia
Our Tab Collection Program
How many tabs in a gallon?
The Aluminium Cathedral
After three years of this site being abandonded, I am once again selling pull tabs, just go to the "Can I buy Tabs?" page of this site. I have over a quarter of a million tabs that need to go away.
I built this site in honor of all the people who 'heard something somewhere from somebody' on a variety of rumors about the collecting and value of tabs, yet nobody know's who it was that said something
You can not turn in a gallon of tabs for a free keg of beer. This rumor started due to a contest at tab fest, one fellow came up with the idea to raise more tabs than anybody else, and told his friends that who ever brought him the most tabs, he would buy a keg of beer, and the winner had turned in 1 gallon of tabs. I have also heard this same rumor where the prize was a guitar but can not prove or disprove it. It also appears that this legend includes $75, $100, $200, $300, etc for a gallon of tabs. Yahoo answers has seen over 58,000 questions on where to redeem their treasure trove of tabs, which means 57,999 people were too stupid to read the previously asked questions.
The tabs are not made out of a higher grade of aluminum. They are in fact the exact same composition as the cans that they come off of. The picture above is 1,000,000 pull tabs, it weighs 650 pounds. That’s all it is worth, whatever the scrap yard pays for 650 pounds of clean aluminum.
The rumor that saving tabs for Ronald McDonald House Charities is pointless because shipping exceeds the value of the tabs is also false. You do not have to mail them to Ronald McDonald House Charities; all you have to do is bring them to any McDonalds. When McDonald’s trucks deliver food, they put collected tabs on the empty trucks, which eventually work their way to primary distribution points. Other organizations that collect tabs just bring them to the scrap yard in their community.
You will hear people quote the snopes.com article saying that tab redemption is a myth. It was a myth until 1992, but snopes will not alter their article. The fastest way to find out if your hospital, or other organization saves tabs, is call them up and ask. If you want to collect tabs for a charity that does not save tabs, save em up, and go to the scrap yard, donate the money you got from the scrap yard.
One of the biggest mistakes made with the tab recycling program, is to say "Why not just recycle the whole can?" To my knowledge, 11 states have deposit laws and it is hard to get some people to give up $1.20 for a case of returnable cans (or $2.40 in the case of Michigan), but to get them to give up 24 tabs, costs nothing. It takes 53 tabs to equal the average non returnable aluminum can, 140 to equal a returnable can, 280 in Michigan.
I might also add that 100 pounds of aluminum tabs takes up the space of a large picnic cooler, where 100 pounds of aluminum cans take up the space of a large van. However I do know you can fit 3,200 pounds of cans in the same van if a local contractor lets a bunch of Cub Scouts run the cans over with a steam roller. Now that was fun!
There are other people out there who collect tabs for arts and crafts projects, I have seen people pay as much as $15 per 1,000. These have been turned into necklaces, key chains, purses, belts, and I even saw a suit of chain mail.
But, while you are here, let me addresse a few other rumors, and that is all they are, rumors, or you are being lied to, there is no third option.
Wheel chairs are made from recycled pull tabs. BULL SHIT!!! Aluminium can not be turned into stainless steel, unless your into alchemy, and if you are, your better off trying to get the gold out of sea water.
Hospitals collect tabs to give dialysis patients free time on dialysis machines. More bullshit! It has never happened, not once, no person has ever received a single minute of free dialysis time from tab redemption. Those bills are paid for by cash, insurance or govornment programs. When is the last time you received a hospital bill that said "Please send us $2,000 or 19 million tabs"? The hospitals do indeed accept the tabs, but they ship them off to the scrap yard, and apply the funds to the over-all budget, they claim it as a profit.
But in the defense of the hospitals, Americans will not be diswayed by facts. My local hospital has informed a local Catholic School 4 years in a row (in writing I might add, I have seen the letter) that it does not even have a dialysis Unit...yet the tabs keep rolling in.
Make America smarter, the next time you here somebody say, "I heard somewhere...", say, BULLSHIT! And then demand that they tell you where they "heard something".
If you insist on believing the rumor that tabs are worth more than scrap metal, please by all means click on the link above, and I will ship you about 4 gallons of tabs for $55.
tabtude1@gmail.com
