How rental ‘libraries of things’ have become the new way to save money

Aatube@kbin.melroy.org to Technology@lemmy.world – 787 points –
How rental ‘libraries of things’ have become the new way to save money
theguardian.com

The theory is simple: instead of buying a household item or a piece of clothing or some equipment you might use once or twice, you take it out and return it.

224

You are viewing a single comment

As a Dutchman, do other countries not have rental places everywhere? Over here every diy store has a rental department, I'd guess this is universal?

In North America you don't see many home improvement stores downtown where people are most likely to rent.

Most Lowe's, Home Depots, etc do have tool rental options, but they're located out in the burbs where land is cheap and everyone has space to store tools.

Home improvement stores and autoparts stores will rent out tools for home projects or automotive projects. Looking at my library they also offer kitchen stuff, arts and crafts, 3d printing, board games and a ton more. I have no idea where you'd rent that kind of stuff here in the US.

There always have been some around. Not all diy stores have one but there is always one near from what I've seen. People keep discovering them and thinking they are new.

What would you search for to find one in your area?

drive the retail areas of town and look for the rental signs. yellow pages. They want to be found by locals so look in the places locals might. hardware stores either rent stuff or will tell you if you ask.

That makes more sense to me, thanks.

We do have rentals, but they're more for large things that you'd use once and never again. Paint sprayers, giant floor sanders, etc.

They don't rent things like table saws, thickness planers, etc, which would fall into weekend warrior kind of tools. They want you to buy those.

I learned a lot about your country during the pan when I started listening to the Dutch News Podcast. You had some wild stuff going on and I got to learn about another culture. But I haven't been turning in lately. Life got busier again. Cheers! Oh, and when a German asks you for something, tell them to first give you back your bike once for me!