Trail Bottle Depot

Positives
Relatively clean for a bottle depot
Ample parking
Lots of shopping carts available for customer use
Well-​organized layout for queuing and getting bottles counted
Computerized count tracking
Touchless sanitizer, soap and water faucet for clean up
Negative
Always short on the count and conveniently forget to include a batch in the computer summation. EVERYTIME
Even with the short-​counting, this is still my preferred bottle depot in the SW quadrant

I’ll be honest, I’m not overly picky when it comes to bottle depots. For me it’s a means to a little extra cash and a way to help out the environment. Having driven by the Heritage LRT many times it was hard not to notice the Trail Bottle Depot next door. This worked well for me being less than a 5 minute drive from my home and a search online confirmed that it was definitely the closest, good enough for me!
I’ve noticed that one of the most critiqued areas of bottle depots is: honesty. Honesty in this case being: do they give you the exact amount owed for your bottle deposit return. I’ve been to about 4 – 5 different bottle depots over the course of my life in different cities/​towns, in speaking to «honesty» or accurate counting I’ve noticed discrepancies at all of them. I’d probably account this more towards average math and organization skills than to the employee/​business deliberately trying to get ahead by ripping off or scamming customers. One thing I’ve personally found helps is coming with smaller volumes. Usually the more you come with the greater chance they’ll mess up the count.
I’ve been to Trail Bottle Depot about half a dozen times in the last year and a half, in this time I’d say about 80% or all but one of my returns was accounted fairly accurate with one time seeming a bit off. So overall, not too bad in that area. As far as customer service goes I’ve never had any WOW experiences at any Bottle Depot, it’s always the same kind of crowd just grinding away and never caring to make much conversation. At times they come off as borderline rude though. I did notice they seemed a little friendly to some «regulars» though.
The biggest draw for me is location/​convenience. As mentioned above this is the number one reason I go here, it’s super close to my place! The hours aren’t anything special, pretty standard business hours and limited weekend hours, but I’ve been able to squeeze in on a couple week nights just because it’s near by. Also I’ve never had issue with parking here, definitely a plus! They have carts available for the customers to use, makes doing it in one trip easy without a lot of back and forth. The facility itself is well… quite dirty as most exchange facilities are lol. One thing I’ve found interesting is it seems they keep collections of special bottles or weird toys/​items on shelves, almost old rustic collectibles. It at least gives you something to ponder about as you’re there waiting lol? One thing I do actually think is great is they have a sink, soap and hand dryer for the customers to use that is all sensor (touchless) activated. Great for cleaning up without getting messy again!
It looks like they also have a number/​call system for busier times, I’ve never seen this in effect on my visits though. Most of the time it doesn’t take too long to get through. However on my most recent visit I found myself waiting at the register for 10+ minutes despite no one being in front of me, my count and total was processed quickly but I guess they only have 1 – 2 people entitled to cash out to customers. I think they could do a better job prioritizing customer cash outs this being said.
So overall, nothing special or WOW about this bottle depot for me other than location. In comparing it to others I’ve been to its on par for the most part with slightly worse customer service, but good location/​convenience for me personally.

Went here for about 10 years due to the close proximity to my residence. I always got less than what I counted. Last time, I was ripped off by about $ 15. Tried Chinook Depot and had faster service and did not get ripped off, so I won’t be back to Trail again.

I’ve been coming to this bottle depot for as long as I can remember.
The staff here are usually pretty friendly and they work their asses off to get you out quick. They sort for you so all you have to do is dump your bag on the counter and away they go.
The customer side of the counter is kept clean and the staff are constantly squeegeeing down the counters.
The depot does have an odour of it’s own, but it’s not that rotten beer smell that you get at some bottle depots.
I would recommend these guys any day!