Most dumper divers are looking for food, industrial or retail waste.

A Vancouver bakery I once frequented use to put all their perishables into a clear bag and place them on top of the dumpster. That dumpster bin never got raided.

Dumpster divers tend to stay away from dumpsters that contain bad smells or if they knowingly contain any amounts of human feces, syringes, rotting meat, bandages etc.

A bin from a produce store smells like a produce store. A bin from a butcher smells rancid and will never get raided (unless the diver is mentally ill).

Dead fishes smell pretty bad. Rotting potatoes are perhaps the worst. Anything that rots in this manner should detour them if they are sane.

Probably raccons or something

Hello and welcome to r/LifeProTips!

Please help us decide if this post is a good fit for the subreddit by up or downvoting this comment.

If you think that this is great advice to improve your life, please upvote. If you think this doesn't help you in any way, please downvote. If you don't care, leave it for the others to decide.

[deleted]

Just put up a sign... they want food and that´s fine but they don´t need to be making a mess.

If there is a suitable place, drill a hole through the lid and bin then fit a large padlock.

Most people believe dumpster divers are looking for food and similar.

That's true in low income areas.

If you live in a medium-high income area, AKA where you don't usually see homeless people around and you can't really tell where the dumpster divers are coming from since you don't really see any person that would look like one around, you're an easy target for scammers, con artists, and fraudsters.

How does this work? What does dumpster diving have to do with it?

Amazon.

People in medium to high income areas have tons of packages delivered to them from Amazon (and other companies) all the time. These dumpster divers aren't looking for food, glass to resell, or anything like that... They want your empty envelopes and boxes.

Why?

The envelopes and boxes have your address, sometimes your phone number and your full name on them. Sometimes, depending on how you do your shopping, they can get the info from you, and someone else living on the same household.

So what?

Say you live with your son and you both have ordered stuff online and both of you threw away the envelopes or boxes the stuff came in. They will be looking at your house until they see your son leave, then they will call you, and make up any kind of story (mentioning your son's full name, address, number as "proof" that he is with them) and try to get money out of you.

I've had them call me telling me my son crashed and they want me to reinburse for the damages or they'll call the cops cause he's drunk, they've said they have kidnapped him, they've told me he got in a fight and killed someone so they need me to pay them to let him go, and a bunch of other stories.

I found out all of this from the police dpt directly after reporting the scam calls I'd been receiving.

How do you stop them?

Tear apart all of your personal info from envelopes and boxes before disposing of them, then put them in a separate bag when throwing them out. They'll grab the bag with the envelopes and such leaving the rest alone and will eventually leave you alone as they realize they won't get any more info from you anymore.

have you tried talking?

It might be desperation honestly. People looking for anything they can get for free to sell online for some extra cash. These are hard times we live in 🥴 not condoning your issue but hopefully sharing some light as to why it happens. I noticed you said in a comment that you’re a household item store- household items can be pricey and not everyone can afford what they need. They might see dumpster diving as an easy way to either one, get the necessities they can not otherwise afford, or two, resell items to make some extra money. Of course, there’s probably other reasons I didn’t list, but I would assume those are the most common ones?

Imagine being possessive over garbage. "It's uncomfortable"