This friend of mine has these $3 glass bowls that came with rubbery-plastic lids for storage, and he uses them for lunches.
Against the instructions on the package, he washes them in the dishwasher. The lids get dried and cracked, and he has to toss them.
He would like to buy more lids only, as the bowls are still just fine. But he can not buy more lids - they are not sold separately, not even from the manufacturer.
So what if he went to the store, and scoured the shelves of products for just the right item - something that will ring up as a 'Lid' when scanned at the register. He jots down the bar code number for the item. Let's say these lids are $1 each.
And then he goes home, prints four bar code labels, returns to the store, and stickers four lids. He drops the newly-labeled lids into his cart with the rest of his purchases, and the cashier rings up everything. New lids! WOOT!
How does this rate on your 'wrongness' scale? It's not stealing, since the lids are being paid for. The customer who buys the glass bowls won't get lids, but they know that before purchase - perhaps there's a customer who doesn't want lids. At worst, the store returns the lids to the manufacturer for replacement, which would be wasteful.
I'd say that it's technically stealing.
ReplyDeleteEither the store owner can't sell the lidless bowls, which means he's out two bucks...or he does sell them and those customers are paying full price for lids they're not receiving.
It's like if you bought a new phone, got it home and discovered the battery was missing, would it matter to you if the person who took it left the storekeeper money for it?
Of course, in that case, the place you bought the phone could give you a new battery and everything would be square...but as you pointed out, you can't get lids seperately