8 Bizarre Ways Corporations Have Attempted to Save $$

UPS has 96,000 trucks which guzzle a lot of gas. When they began to analyze ways to cut fuel costs, someone figured out that it takes more gas to make a left turn than it does a right. In 2004, they implemented their no-left turn policy, and haven't looked back (theoretically speaking, of course.) This move not only saved them 10 million gallons of gas, but cut emissions equal to 53,000 cars' exhaust fumes in a year.

Less is More (Money): The McDouble with 1 slice of cheese

Here's a sneaky trick McDonalds did in 2008: they removed one of the pieces of cheese from the Double Cheeseburger (which also contained 2 patties), took it off the dollar menu, and renamed it “The McDouble." This switcheroo allegedly saved 6 cents per sandwich and $15,000 per year per restaurant.

We think of bank receipts as small, light, and quickly tossed into the trash. But for bank behemoth B of A, it's not just a waste of money, but also environmentally unsound. They changed the weight of its ATM receipts from 20 lbs to 15, saving $500,000 (and a lot of trees.)

This is a famous story oft repeated in corporate circles, of how Bob Crandall, the CEO of American Airlines, had the company remove a single olive from each in-flight salad they serve, saving them money. While it does seem this anecdote is actually true, the savings have been reported as high as $500,000 per year and as low as $40,000. Although it does seem like a tiny adjustment, with an airline as large as AA serving as many meals as they do per day per flight per year, well... you do the math.

Coffee, Tea, or Charity?

Speaking of weight, European airline Ryanair has been famous for cutting every corner in order to lessen their flying weight, including reducing ice and the size of their in-flight magazine from A5 to A4 paper. But they literally took the cake by asking their flight attendants to shed some pounds, with the added “motivation” of appearing in the Ryanair Calendar.

“That's it, I quit!! OK, where's my money...?”

Amazon.com has an “outside-the-box” way of thinking about everything, including keeping their employees. At Amazon's huge warehouses, full-time employees are offered up to $5000 to quit their job. The goal is “to encourage folks to take a moment and think about what they really want." The reasoning is, in the long run neither the company or the person is happy, potentially wasting even more time and money.

Sorry, We're Closed (for 4 days)

Internet Network behemoth Cisco went “clinically dead” for 4 days between December 29 and January 2. All workers were placed on mandatory leave. This move was partially an accounting gimmick and was part of other cost-cutting measures that allegedly saved the company a billion dollars. That's quick a trick!

“It's the font, stupid.”

We're including this story even though it hasn't been implemented and it's not for a corporation, but it was just so cool (and the inspiration for this list) that we had to. Suvir Mirchandani is a 14-year-old whiz kid who realized that his school district could save as much as $21,000 per year on paper and ink, just by changing their typeface to Garamond. Impressed, his teacher encouraged him to take his idea larger, and see how much the U.S. government could save. With numbers from the General Services Administration, Suvir figured there could be a savings of $136 million per year, with even more savings if the states joined in. He sent in his proposal, but has yet to hear back (in any font).