Did it all the time as a kid.... My grandparents had some property and there was their house, then the gas station, then the diner, then a small row of stores.... little "corner grocery" , barbershop/beauty parlor, and something else. All backed up to their "pond".... that years prior was dug out for an ice pond... used to have the ice house just below the gas station.... The grocery made sandwiches and working guys stopped all the time and got lunch and a bottle of soda... many times they just left the bottles.... Us 3 kids would go down behind the stores, and all along the pond, and collect any bottles we found. The grocer was a long time renter from my grandparents... and he would take the bottles and pay us for them. They had a closed in storage place where they kept them to be returned to the respective soda dealers...