A group of litter pickers couldn’t believe their luck after discovering a 27-year-old Big Mac carton dating back to 1996.
The almost perfectly intact polystyrene wrapper was found dumped in bushes along St Richards Road, in Evesham, Worcestershire, close to a McDonald’s.
Volunteers found it dated back to 1996 – at a time when Three Lions was topping the charts, Trainspotting was a box office hit and Tickle Me Elmo was the top toy.
Laura Van Toller, organiser at Anti-Litter Evesham, came across the item in shrubbery around a quarter of a mile away from the nearest McDonald’s.
She said fast food rubbish is one of the most common things the community group tends to pick up in the area.
Laura, of Evesham, said: ‘We have a Costa, KFC, and McDonalds, and they are all regular items we find.
‘Sometimes we find Burger King or Starbucks packaging, which we do not even have in the town.
‘People will get their fast food through their car window, so it goes out the same window.’
Laura found the item while picking as part of her own ‘My Rubbish January’ where she set herself the goal of picking up rubbish every day during the month.
She picked up a full bag of trash every day for 31 days – but said the town did not seem to get any cleaner despite her efforts.
She added: ‘Every day there are McDonald’s cups, crisp packets or cigarette butts.
‘I wish I could say Evesham was cleaner after this, but there was something replacing the thing I picked up the day before every day.
‘I was just maintaining it. Week two into this made me quite depressed. I just felt like, what was the point?
‘Now, though, I really feel like I have achieved something as I have still stuck to it.’
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