Sometimes it’s the little things that can catch your attention when you visit another country. During my two wonderful trips to the United Kingdom, their stylish red mail boxes and phone booths were among my favorite items. I even have a toy phone booth replica sitting on my curio shelf as a keepsake.
Related to the mail boxes, here are some interesting factoids from the BBC about rubber band use by the Royal Mail in Great Britain that I stumbled across on the BBC’s website.
- In 2010, postal service workers used two million rubber bands each and every day to bind bundles of mail.
- In the past five years, that equates to four billion rubber bands, which cost the service approximately five million pounds to purchase.
- The Royal Mail uses biodegradable rubber bands, but concerns have been expressed about the litter and choking hazard to animals from all these rubber bands.
The Royal Mail should be commended for at least using biodegradable rubber bands. However, as this data clearly points out, we all should try to reuse or properly dispose of small items like rubber bands, paper clips, bottle caps, twisty-ties, and the like. They may seem insignificant to us, but they can be very dangerous to small animals and children, while also looking quite tacky just laying about.
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Panethos 