Pastafreak, if you are happy to not have a cover on any unused portion of your cream in the fridge, then that is a matter for you.
Personally, to avoid the likelihood of bacterial or other contamination or spillage, I require a lid.
I object to having to pay for a more expensive brand of the cottage cheese/ yogurt in order to obtain a lid for the product.
There is no direction on these products that it should be consumed in one sitting and it's reasonable that the consumer may wish to put any unused content in the fridge for storage. With this in mind, it's not unreasonable to have a lid on the product to protect the contents.
If I buy a 2 litre bottle of Coke, it comes with a plastic cap that allows me to take what I wish from the bottle and reseal it until the next time. Coke bottles don't come with a foil cap so I have to use it all at once. This same thinking applies to milk and umpteen other products sold in the dairy section and elsewhere in a supermarket. Why sell budget versions of yogurt etc differently?
Naughty? No. Questionable? Yes. The answer is in the hands of the manufacturer and retailer. The lids on the non-budget types are fully recyclable if the manufacturers are to be believed. I'd happily pay a few pence more for the budget product to have a lid no matter what justification the manufacturer disclosed. Then the problem goes away. Simples.
If enough lids disappear off the more expensive range, just maybe the retailers will direct their attention to the matter. Besides, who wants someone to look in their fridge and say: "Wow, you must be rich - you have a lid on your yogurt"