Anybody who's ever had a prescription is familiar with that orange plastic bottle — and maybe you feel guilty just throwing it out. Fortunately, one TikToker has a clever suggestion for repurposing them.
The scoop
TikTok account Discoveringnatural (@discoveringnatural_) posted a video showing how to convert a prescription medication bottle into a handy storage container.
@discoveringnatural_ Here is how to reuse your prescription bottles in this Organizing Tips & Tricks✅ House Organizing can be so mych fun 💕💕 #houseorganization #organizedhome #organizingtiktok #tiktokshopdealsforyoudays #dealsforyoudays #creatorsearchinsights #backtoschool #summersavings #summerdeals #tiktokbacktoschool #tiktokshopbacktoschool #fyp #TreasureFinds #TikTokCreatorSearchInsightsIncentive #reuse #reuserecycle ♬ Come Check This (Quickie Edit) - FETISH
"Stop throwing away your prescription bottles. You can use this for so many things," she says, demonstrating how she's removed the medication label and thoroughly cleaned a bottle.
"Everybody has this junk bucket [or] junk Tupperware," she continues, showing her own plastic tub of assorted odds and ends. "I have a lot of screws in it, so I'm going to store all my screws in [the pill bottle]."
She then affixes a new label to the bottle. "You can have so many different things you can do with this," she concludes.
"House organizing can be so much fun," she writes in the video description.
How it's working
According to Georgetown University, 66% of adult Americans take at least one prescription medication. Given that the orange bottles are not generally recyclable using curbside recycling, per GoodRx, that means an exorbitant number of bottles end up in landfills every year.
Unfortunately, those bottles will break down in a landfill incredibly slowly. And when they do, they can release toxic, planet-warming gases such as methane into the atmosphere, as the Natural Resources Defense Council and U.N. Environment Programme explain.
While a plastic-free alternative would be the ideal solution, environmentally conscious consumers can still find a way to repurpose those bottles as an alternative. This extends their useful life cycle, keeping them out of landfills (and lakes, rivers, and oceans) and helping save money on storage solutions.
Similar to this video's screw storage idea, people have suggested a myriad of uses for the pill bottles. From storing a single serving of salad dressing in a lunchbox, to packing first-aid materials and firestarters for camping, to measuring out a single load of laundry detergent for the laundromat, the possibilities are endless.
You can even donate the bottles to organizations like Matthew 25: Ministries, local homeless shelters, and local vet clinics — these groups all use the pill bottles to dispense toiletries and medications for those in need.
What people are saying
Nearly everybody has thrown away a pill bottle at one time or another, so people across the internet are always glad for ideas on how to give them a second life.
One Apartment Therapy article listed suggestions ranging from using the bottles as toothpick storage to filling them with bells to make a DIY cat toy.
"This is a real issue, people," one person commented on that article. "We put too much plastic in the landfill."
HowStuffWorks also suggested using them for travel, whether it's storing jewelry, lotions for a flight, or earbuds.
"I can't stand throwing those containers away," one person commented on another video with repurposing suggestions. "Thank you for another tip on reusing them."
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