I went into the Dollar Store and was astonished at the number of balloons that were lodged in their ceiling. This picture just shows a fraction of the waste; in reality, there were dozens more.
In a similar situation, on my previous excursions to Land’s End clearance sales and outlets I have seen bins of stockings, backpacks and totes that were incorrectly monogrammed – and thus accumulating unsold even at the bargain price of a dollar.
It’s one thing to make a mistake once, but another to make the same type of error over and over again. Gains in speed are offset by the losses from carelessness, not to mention the environmental impact of that which ends up being tossed before use.
Take a moment to assess your mistake rates. How much food ends up in the compost pile because it was incorrectly prepared? How many reams of paper head straight to the recycle bin because of errors in printing? How much paint is wasted because of improper color matching?
We generate enough waste from things that are done correctly. Don’t add to the problem by adding a host of mistakes to the landfill.
