I have had for a long time a tea kettle I really love. Actually bought two of them – the big league one for me, and the other for son Brian – for him and for my tea when I’m at his house. Beautiful and elegant and European.
Mine got a cracked top when I let it boil dry. That didn’t bother me. Then the whistle stopped whistling and I could live with that. Then the whistle just fell apart – that bothered me. I tried to screw it back together – the threads were worn. Didn’t want to glue it, given all the heat it takes and the toxicity of most glues.
So I looked up the manufacturer’s name on the bottom and emailed them about the cost of a new whistle – thinking that since Europe is way ahead of us climate-wise, this would be easy to do. Not so. They wanted me to simply go by another tea kettle.
I explained that I didn’t want to just throw away a good and beautiful tea kettle. I wanted to buy another whistle. This disposable culture is not healthy, and I want to live a more sustainable / recyclable life. If they couldn’t sell it to me, could they direct me to their supplier?
So they emailed that they were going to send me another tea kettle, after I mailed mine to them. I was astonished, knowing it was a fairly expensive item. I did go ahead and mail it in, and they’ve emailed that my new one will be here within the week. (What did we do without email? All those envelopes and stamps….)
I’m glad to be getting a perfect new tea kettle – but I sure wish we had a culture where I could have just bought the whistle. Maybe they’ll think about my email, and begin to stock them. A small change – but a step in the right direction.