The bulb hoarders

BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | The bulb hoarders

Hence the stockpilers. "I'm stocking up now, before they're banned or get ridiculously expensive," says Bradley, an insurance broker from West Sussex. "The green ones might save you money and everything, but I just can't stand them."

"They don't look right," he explains. "They're not bright enough and they take an age to come on. That's not what you want from a light bulb. You want it to light up the whole room, just like that." He clicks his fingers.

Jo, who works in the same office, agrees. "I did try the energy saving ones," she says, "but they're not the same. One of them made a buzzing noise, one of them kept going on and off. We gave up on them."

Are they not concerned about the environmental impact of incandescent bulbs? "I do my bit," says Bradley. "Recycling and all that. But at the end of the day, if they want us to use those bulbs they'll have to make them better."

"And anyway," he adds, "they've got mercury in, haven't they, these so-called green bulbs? What's that going to do to the environment?"