Where can i go to donate my soda can tabs??

I saw this little box and poster for the Ronald McDonald house to collect and donate soda pop tabs. I said to myself, this can't be real, this is the urban legend where people were convinced to collect pull tabs to exchange for kidney dialysis time. Was I a witness to an urban legend out in the wild? There was a phone number on the poster so I did more investigation. Yes, Ronald McDonald house collects pop tabs for recycle. In my discussions with the local Ronald McDonald house personnel, I asked some questions and found out a few things. Why not recycle the whole can instead of just the tab? They say that the tab has more aluminum in it than the rest of the can. This is not true according to snopes, and common sense. They do recycle the tabs. They get $0.42/lb of tabs and raised almost $4000 in 2005 by recycling about 7 million tabs. The money raised goes to pay bills for families that use Ronald McDonald house that are not covered by other donations or funding. Ronald McDonald house has a noble mission: Provide a "home away from home" for families of seriously ill children receiving treatment at nearby hospitals. The staff was very nice to me and showed me their tubs and tubs of pull tabs and provided the information above about the program. Still, I can't but help there is a better way for them to raise funds for their cause. Why not recycle the whole can, at 14 grams it weighs more than twenty times what the tab (0.6 grams) weighs. The person who had the tab had the can, it would have been 20 times more money raised. Better still, just collect pennies instead of the tabs. There are 181 pennies in a pound, that's $1.38 extra per pound for the charity. I felt so bad for their misjudgment that I got some information about donating and I am sending them a check. Maybe their pull tab collection program generates donations after all.

The tabs have no inherent value. [except as scrap aluminum for recycling] You would be better saving the whole cans and taking them to be recycled [then donate the actual cash]. Snopes has this one on file, by the way: http://www.snopes.com/business/redeem/pulltabs.asp

The VFW, Veterans of Foreign Wars. I am in the Ladies Auxiliary. We collect them all year long. They go to different charities for our military veterans. What could be a better cause. Thank You in advance.

that's an urban myth!

I understand that you can donate them to the Ronald McDonald House. I collect them and give them to a local day school. They in turn know where to give them. If noone gives you an answer, let me know and I'll email the school and find out. It's a good cause. I believe it helps parents stay there at a very reduced cost when they have children in the hospital and can't afford the stay. And it's no myth! We collect tons of them.

I think it is a fluke. We have doctors here, and heard you could donate tabs to help with kidney dialysis, the dialysis docs say it is not true. We stopped saving.

I have been saving them for years and giving them to my niece up in Ohio to give to a friend. Something about kidney dialysis. I live in Texas and I think I have given her about 5 gallon jugs full in the last 6 years.

Waaay back I heard that some places used them for wheelchairs, sorry it was so long ago that I don't really remember, but you might want to go to a local community center and see if they can help?

The only place I can think of to check would be schools, especially grammar schools. Call some area (or out of area) schools.