There’s that old saying: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
It’s an adage Very Canadian Singer Justin Bieber takes very seriously when it comes to the good old old peel-tab lids Tim Hortons formerly used on their cups. Bieber took to Instagram last month just to air out his burning nostalgia for the lids.
Now, in a hilariously fitting turn of events, Canadians have sprung into a post-holiday entrepreneurial spirit: those old lids are suddenly turning up for sale online, with price tags reaching upwards of $200 … per lid.
Watch: Tim Hortons starts ultimate collaboration with ... Shawn Mendes. Story continues below.
A search of Facebook Marketplace for “Tim Hortons lids” will bring up some fascinating listings. “Tim Horton’s lids. Classic style. Never been used” are apparently $50 apiece. “Antique Tim Hortons collectible” lids come with an opening bid of $100 each.
Or, perhaps the best one: “Extremely used ‘vintage’ Tim Hortons coffee lid,” appraised and now available at the very considered, generous, even charitable price of $1,000,000.
This is, mostly, we think, a joke spurred by Bieber’s passionate disgust at what he called “a damn outrage.”
“I was really moved when I read the article about Justin Bieber. He was terribly upset [by the new lids] and I recognize that Canadians take their Timmies very seriously,” Leah Laroque, who is selling her own bundle of lids for $100 online, joked in an interview with CBC News.
She said she’s received a gamut of responses from incredulous to serious.
When the lids initially began to be phased out in the summer of 2018, Canada’s ideological division had reached an apotheosis. Some were elated at the swap, and they bathed in the glory of the “pucker/peel” model.
Maclean’s called the revamped lids — which are taller and feature a raised dome and tabbed closure — a “huge improvement.” It was, apparently the culmination of over two years of research, 12 research studies, and thousands of assisting guests. A professor of architecture and design from New York University, who owns the largest collection of disposable beverage lids, even told the magazine the new model was “just fantastic.”
But many devout Tim Hortons fans vented online about how they hated the new lids, arguing they leaked … more. An online petition was started, imploring Tims to bring back the old lids.
The premiere of the new lid happened to coincide with Justin Trudeau’s announcement of a ban on single-use plastic. It turns out that, while “theoretically recyclable,” polypropylene — the plastic those controversial new lids are made of — wasn’t likely to be recycled by customers, according to Sarah King, head of Greenpeace Canada’s oceans and plastics campaign.
Plus, Greenpeace Canada found Tim Hortons to be in its top two plastic polluters in Canada out of 240 companies it audited last year. Hence Bieber’s statement, “Tbh it shouldn’t be plastic, find a way to be recyclable, let’s change the world 1 lid at a time.”
With all of that being said, there’s at least one winner in all of this: Justin Bieber, who, following his outburst, was gifted a stack of those old lids for free after attending a hockey game in Toronto last month.
Does he know he’s just become a collector of a very rare antique?
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