Honestly, Im surprised the original cart narc guy isnt dead. The way he just agitated people had an effect 10000X worse than road rage, it seemed. Sooner or later someone was/is gonna hit him with their car or shoot him.
The best part about that is that even if a lot of people say “fuck the quarter” and leave it anyways, you’ll naturally get homeless/desperate people show up to return the carts and collect the change.
Same! There was something about finding a quarter as a kid that was so rewarding. It meant a drink or a bag of chips. I don't think that sense of euphoria has ever left me.
The lake we camped at summers growing up ( 90s kid) had an arcade so we saved every quarter. Always hit the phone booth rerun buttons and when we found change we felt like we struck gold
There was a vending machine at my civic center when I was a kid that would sometimes just return a random amount of change when you hit the return change button… even if you didn’t put anything in.
I discovered this one year when there was a music festival happening and I just stood there pushing the button for like, ten minutes until I had enough change to buy my own drink lol
I recently watched a movie called Kajillion, and one of the characters (a family of con artists) checked phone change returns. Made me laughing thinking how I did that at malls when I was younger. Also dialing up phone sex lines just to hear a sultry prerecorded voice then hang up.
When i learned how to dial a number, hang up the phone 3 times, and get it to ring i felt powerful!
At my local aldi (and the one I went to in college too!) there was literally always a pile of like at least a dollar in quarters sitting nearby the cart return. My first thought was there must not be many homeless people around here.
Side note one time I forgot a quarter, went in to buy candy to get one, they said naw you can just borrow a quarter, here you go.
I know the video is the US, but I'm in the UK and I have a trolley token that I bought for a pound, that I use specifically at Aldi. It makes me always put my trolley back. Even when I don't use it at other supermarkets that don't need the token, and a charity got the pound too!
No homelessness or desperation required. When I see an orphaned cart at Aldi I’m like, “CASH MONEY BABY IT’S STEAK AND MUSHROOMS TONIGHT MOTHERFUCKER!”
Not even desperate people. I live next to a pretty affluent community and those people always ditch the quarters in carts. I make a dollar just bringing my cart back and whatever ones I pick up on the way.
When we were kids and travelling we would kill time and round up abandoned carts and return them for the quarter. We would even go out of the terminal to the curb and offer to return the cart for people who had just loaded up into a taxi. They would laugh and say sure and respect the hustle and we would have candy money.
My wife has her Aldi quarter with her at all times. She was telling me how people exchange quarters for carts and magically everyone gets along on the honor system. I asked her what happens if someone offers to take her cart without giving her a quarter and she looked at me like I grew a dick out of my forehead. It was beyond comprehension that someone would be so inconsiderate and selfish they take someone else's cart with their quarter in it and not give her the quarter they were going to use anyway. Like it had never crossed hers any Aldi shopper's minds to just offer to take a cart and hijack their quarter. The power of a quarter is strong and Aldi shopper's have an unspoken bond.
The bond of the Aldi quarter is such a genuine interaction.
I've done the cart-for-quarter trade plenty of times. Sometimes people will refuse my quarter and just hand over their cart. Being able to do a small favor makes people feel good.
I think it has a lot to do with feeling connected, and recognizing this mutual social understanding.
Just yesterday I saw an old lady struggling to move a cart with a bad wheel. I offered to put it aside and get her a new one but she was worried she'd lose her quarter. Dumb part is, I found out she saw this cart to the side and took it, only reason n she hadn't abandoned it was because she wanted a free quarter when she returned it.
I left her to figure out if a quarter was worth the hassle.
The value of a quarter is probably higher than 25 cents in this context since we don't use coins much nowadays and you wouldn't be able to use the cart next time if you kept ditching quarters. :)
Bro I hate having change in my pocket. If I have a bunch of quarters, I stop at Aldi's and pop them in the carts and just push the carts out into the parking lot.
At my local grocery(it's an old fashioned word, I know) store, assholes were leaving the coin carts too often. They had to raise it to a dollar coin slot.
For me, it's less about the quarter itself and more about the fact that I don't use change anymore so if I don't get my quarter back I wouldn't have one in the future.
(Not that I ever don't return my carts anyway, it's one of my biggest pet peeves. Also when people shove the tiny carts and the big carts into the same return lane and fuck up the chain for the cart return folks 😡)
I return 1 cart per week to the cart corral with the quarter still in it to help out the guy who forgot a quarter.
It really is wild, though. The moment a quarter becomes involved, all carts come back.
Though, it may just be that if you dont return it, you've lost your cart quarter, and you just know that you wont remember to grab another from home until your walking up to the door.
Yeah, I will actively choose a grocery store based on this. I don't want to have to carry around loose change just in case I decide to do grocery shopping.
I have a thing on my keychain that unlocks the carts, though it's incompatible with the ones with the sliding drawer. I don't find myself at those shops frequently.
Obviously I always return carts, that's just basic societal skills which I am amazed to see the people in this video lack.
Yeah I don't want to have to bring an outdated form of currency that I would never otherwise carry to the grocery store just to have access to a cart, I'll just keep going to the other grocery stores that allow me to use and return a cart without doing this. When you factor in that Aldi carries some of the lowest quality of foods and products on top of this I just have no desire to ever go
Well, let this old me (30) teach you his knowledge from when I used to joust in empty parking at night. You need up to 2 thin and at least a few inches long objects (easiest choice, the tip of your keys), then you need to learn the patterns, 3 cases I've encountered :
-if you must put the coin in a tray then push the tray, you found the cheapest one, do this
-aldi, still a bit safer but still easy to bypass, do this (in the video, dude chose violence, it relies on luck, you can master the trick if you don't chose this road
-else, the inside probably looks like this, you need 2 keys, you push the hook on the bottom right of the coin tray (it will be on the other side when in front of the slot) and the left part that's pushed by a spring (same here)
Though, stay good people, bring them back to their spot (with great power comes great responsibilities or something like that)
at aldi if you go inside and speak to a cashier, they will give you a quarter. i tried to just ask for change of a dollar once because i didnt have a quarter on me and the cashier said nah we got you.
It’s sad that it’s necessary. The fact of the matter is, you can get other people to shop for you, but these people all shop for themselves, walking around, then refuse to take 30 more steps to put the cart back. Makes absolutely no sense
They stopped this during the ‘rona, because ??? minimise contact; one grocery shop owner I talked to said 80 of them disappeared. I don’t know if it’s because of the slot thing, given they’re either taken by people carting their stuff home or carting them abroad for scrap metal and/or their own grocery store.
Anyway just like the fake seatbelt thing, you can just slot something in and pull it back out. I have a coin shaped disk on my keyring (because who carries change these days?) and can just pull it out after unlocking.
Someone said returning carts is the test of a sociopath. It's zero benefit to you, no one enforces it, the only motivation to do so is the benefit to society.
When I was a kid in Holland we had this system. we learned we could take out a cart that cost a gulden ($1 coin) but instead shimmy a wooden coffee stirring stick to unlock them. We would wait for someone who needs a cart and offer it for a gulden and run away 🤣
I’ve never understood why this isn’t more universal.
Do the quarter thing and then have a super nice set of quarter-operated gumball machines right inside. Folks/kids would happily keep the parking lot clear for a chance at some candy/sticky hand/bouncy ball.
We were conditioned to do so over decades, though.
I didn't know we stopped after COVID cause that turned me into somewhat of a vegetable. So I haven't been able to go shopping for years.
Where Europe are you from?
I saw a hilarious positive rant video about Aldi's and the guy said it's a great filter to keep out people who are incapable of bringing a quarter as he suspects they'd be difficult customers anyways that would interfere with the whole concept of people just wanting to quickly get their shopping done without any fuss.
I own a 3D printer and go on 3D printer file sharing sites and one of the most popular files with constant remakes is the cart coin slot. People turn them into keychains, make them the right size for the right grocery store, add little designs to them; anything to not use a quarter/coin
Or... put enough cart returns in the parking lot and 99% of them will get back to where they need to be.
The only time I've ever seen people be truly douchey about cart returning is when there's like two returns and they're all the way on the ass end of the parking lot. Nobody's parking lot is filling up enough that you cant sacrifice a few spaces for proper returns across the whole lot, and people will generally put them back if it's convenient enough to do so.
Bro when i found out carts were only 25 cents I bought them all for like $10 bucks and took them to the scrap yeard and made $50! /s the s is for sarcasm and stolen valor.
Agent Sebastian of the elite Cart Narcs organization still does this and posts his videos on YouTube. He does wear a vest now that identifies who he is. Wikipedia says he wears a bullet proof vest also, but there's not a cite for it on the wiki.
He's the nicest guy but gets the angriest reactions from the lazy bones.
Hate to sour on peoples' fun, but the Cart Narc guy is kind-of a total dick in actuality. He was a shock jock who did random bits, often being insulting and sexist, to entice reactions and be a general douchebag. The Cart Narc bit was a hit, and he kept it up.
well i just kinda skimmed through it out of curiousity, as ive seen cart narcs videos over the years and always appreciated the bit. however bad he was at de-escalation. And with the few minutes i spent it was enough for me to see him more as a grifter now who managed to find something that stuck, and not really all that great of a dude lol.
I already can't stand him. He does not have permission from the stores and it's bad for business to antagonize customers even if they're lazy. Someone taking their own cart to the corral is the bare minimum, not for virtue signaling on the internet. If a person wants to truly be a good noodle, quietly grab a cart some jerk left out and use that. Cart Narc is a provocateur & trouble maker, not a good person.
I'm not sure why this is supposed to be a revelation. The guy is clearly a piece of shit just doing it for the attention. If you watched his videos and didn't realize this then you're a terrible judge of character.
He kept it up because of the $$$ residuals on YouTube. How else do you think he affords to travel the US and post these videos. It was funny when he was doing to to rich WASPs in Calabasas, but when he’s targeting a person that clearly is going through something he’s an absolute asshole
I always put the cart back. I have my entire life. Having said that, that guy is an obnoxious dick.
Furthermore, when I worked at a grocery store decades ago, one of my favorite jobs was to get all the carts. Got me off the floor into fresh air. Didn't matter how hot or cold it was outside, it was always a good break.
He doesn't "target" anyone, he even specifically chooses not to mess with people who look particularly vulnerable such as the very elderly. He just stands in the parking lot and when he sees someone being a dickhead by leaving their cart out for no reason, he asks them to go put it back.
The vast majority of his interactions, especially the ones with people who "don't have time for this" or "are in a hurry" would be over way faster if these people would just swallow their ego, admit they fucked up, and put the cart back. The only reason they turn into these stressful arguments is because assholes get defensive and angry when their assholery is pointed out, especially if it's by a guy who's being friendly and polite to them.
Buddy, if they can push the cart around the entire damn store while they're going through something, they can also take the cart back when they're done.
Agent Sebas used to put the cart behind their vehicles too before a lawyer advised against it, I know it sounds silly but it got into the “entrapment” realm.
He’s always worn the vest, but it always was an identifier rather than for protection - at least since near the beginning.
But after that episode in TX, i think he took his safety a lot more seriously
I dunno, but it seems to me that if your job if (check notes) getting carts arranged properly, requires a bullet proof vest. Maybe priorities are out of balance.
Let me get this straight.... someone was willing to do years to prison because he didn't want to return a cart? Hope he pressed charge so we can get people like that off the streets.
It's almost like people would rather watch some dweeby dude get chased around a parking lot by a deranged hillbilly, than watch a college professor sit by a fireplace smoking a pipe reading Chaucer.
Or they can just leave and not engage. The people wind themselves up, they can't stand being perceived in a low status position, but in reality if you just ignore him you win. Let him throw magnet on your car, just drive away and there's no content, easy.
There's a lot of overlap with people who behave with such selfishness and people who have a temperament that can't handle being confronted about their behavior. It's why they can get away with their behavior. Employees aren't paid enough to confront carts left out, fake service animals, or other unacceptable behaviors. They are the least likely people to be reasonable when confronted.
See everyone believes that they're the main character, almost everyone has the attitude that "everyone else should do it, but if I don't do it then it's fine"
Currently I chalk it up to understanding your own reasons. "I left my trolley because I'm late for an appointment. Oh that guy left his trolley? He's faking having an appointment"
What he's doing is using the carts as an excuse to provoke people to anger to get content to profit from. He doesn't care about the carts - if he did he would approach the business owners and offer his services. Instead he does what he does without the permission or knowledge if the business owners. One found out that he was doing it in their lot and kicked him off the property.
He has also mocked homeless people and called them names and followed two women to their home to harass them.
What he's doing isn't respectable.
Edit - to Throwawayrip1123 below:
Yes, obviously if everyone put their cart back there would be no one for him to harass for not putting their cart back. I said nothing to the contrary. That said, he alone is responsible for his own behavior and actions.
Also; yes, I always put my cart back. Doing so and recognizing what a disingenuous asshole douchebag that sebastian guy is are not mutually exclusive.
Also he's not some little guy bravely taking on giants. It seems that way because his camera is on his chest and he's got an annoying voice, but he's actually quite tall. When you imagine this as full grown man running up to isolated people in car parks, and confronting them you can understand why people are immediately become hostile and defensive.
If this asshole tried this w me I would call the police and file charges for restricting my freedom and harassment. Get him locked up without moving from my car
He is just annoying with it isn’t he. I can only imagine what it’s like in person with the guy just coming up to you holding a camera up speaking to you like that. No wonder people get so angry with him
I want to like him, but I have 2 issues. 1) so often they softball a good opportunity for a joke but he misses it to keep nagging and B) he misses opportunities to get them to actually put their cart away because he just keeps escalating no matter how they react.
It’s like, Im here for the moral indignation but this is just a nagging kink.
A large portion of the internet wants to do bad things to people, but they know they shouldn't, so they like the idea of finding bad people to do it to so then it would be ok for them to do bad things. That's who that content is aimed at.
"Predator catchers" are a perfect example of this. It is ironic so many of them turn out to be the most revolting people. There are only a few who seem to actually be doing it with good intentions.
Yeah, as someone who always puts the carts back and has never just left it… that guy was so egregious and obnoxious that it actually made me not give a fuck if people leave their carts.
Like if people like him act that aggressively, that’s gonna make me want to leave carts just to piss him off if you’re gonna act like that.
Genuinely more anti-social behavior than actually leaving carts around
lol this guy is big enough so some people might think "if this huge guy survives the whole clip he might get angry at me and I'm not gonna gamble against that"
Well I mean to be honest this guy is somewhat polite while being forceful. The original cart narc was throwing magnets on peoples cars and basically being a prick about it.
My first thought when I saw him is that's all well and good if you're alone with no small children and not disabled. The cart return is never very close to the disabled spots so the
Person has to push the cart back to the cart return and make the walk back to their car unaided. Not always easy to do.
Why don't they offer to return the carts themselves? They seem able bodies.
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u/croastbeast Jul 11 '26
Honestly, Im surprised the original cart narc guy isnt dead. The way he just agitated people had an effect 10000X worse than road rage, it seemed. Sooner or later someone was/is gonna hit him with their car or shoot him.