case study: Returnable plastic crates at RSA

摘要

In a highly competitive dairy industry,the crates did not incur a deposit charge because the dairies could not agree nor trust each other to implement a deposit system simultaneously. Although crate theft was a huge problem, the risk of market loss for the individual dairy to implement a deposit system first, was too high. The dairy would monitor a crate account for each customer, tracking number delivered and collected, but was still unable to force customers to better guard against crate theft, and any pressure would result in substitution with another supplier.