Plastic Bags

[aggienaut]

   When I returned from a month out of country last winter, and of course immediately had to go to the grocery store to stock the refridgerator and pantry I'd left bare, I was taken a bit aback when the cashier asked if I'd like to buy a bag. I looked where the plastic grocery bags had always been, there was nothing there. The cashier was indicating a seperate pile of sturdier plastic bags. What was this madness??
   "uh, how much are they?" I asked
   "Fifteen cents"
   "uh, okay" I said, still a bit shaken by this break in the normal reality of such a mundane transaction.
   "Ta" she said, which my brain invariably translates as "fuck off and die" though they say it cheerfully.

   It took me awhile to get used to keeping the bags in my car, especially since they're invariably brought in to the kitchen when full of groceries and then I'm not about to go back out to the car after loading them into the pantry and fridge, esp if its cold and rainy out, so I still regularly find them not in the car. Or I happen by the grocery store in the work truck -- since I live way out of town, if work brings me by the grocery I'm gonna run in for resupply, and find I have no bags in the work truck. Even though they're only fifteen cents, I have long since bought so many bags that I refuse to buy one more.

   And so, more often than not I am limited to simply buying only as many groceries as I can hold in my hands. I really wonder how many other people have adapted this strategy. It's gotta be hurting their sales, since they're always strategizing to trick people into seeing and buying things they didn't really need. Surely I'm not the only one who will now forgo that $5 tub of icecream for want of a $0.15 bag. Even people that remember to bring their bags, if they brought three bags they're not going to buy four bags of stuff.

   The other day I was caught out with slightly more than would be easy to carry out to the car by hand. As I even then hemmed and hawed about buying another bag, the cashier helpfully pointed to a stack of cardboard boxes that had been located near the entrance and asked if I'd like one for free. Of course I did. Ta. Since then I've noticed ever more customers loading their groceries into cardboard boxes. We are learning to make do. The consumer ecosystem adjusts.


   They claim the reason is environmental, I think. I have never seen an official statement on the subject. And I consider myself a serious environmentalist, but I have questions about this whole thing. These new bags are made from the exact same material as the old ones, I'm told, just thicker. Why can't they just make bags out of a biodegradable material? Surely that is possible. Or even make them out of a material that was recyclable (recycle bins are ubiquitous but the shopping bags never qualified). I frankly, cycnically, suspect the decision to go from free bags to 15 cent bags was economic not environmental in motivation, but it really seems to me like it would be causing people to purchase less. Or maybe its politics, because I think the decision was made not just by one grocery store but seems to have been simulteniously adopted by them all, and so, as happens in environmental politics, like the EU randomly banning pesticides due to political pressure rather than science, I'm guessing some politicians decided banning single use plastic bags would buff their environmentalist credentials. And I guess put that way, yeah I'd be in favor of "banning single use plastic bags," that's the right set of key words to get my environmentalist blood up, as I visualize sea lions choking on plastic bags blowing in the wind. But key words or key word phrases are a toxic element of politics that short-circuits thinking a problem all the way through and facilitates portraying things as black and white. Is it black and white? Are you totally for single use plastic bags or against them? What I'm for is not choking sea lions -- surely in this day and age instead of doing that with a more survivable multi-use plastic bag of the same material we can come up with some biodegradable single use bag that will get your ice cream home but if exposed to sustained sunlight, submerged in salt-water, or chomped on by a sea lion, it will give with the consistency of cotton candy? Like, I don't know, it's almost like you cold make a bag out of recycled paper or something....

Comments

[cazzicles.livejournal.com]

I frankly, cycnically, suspect the decision to go from free bags to 15 cent bags was economic not environmental in motivation..

Sadly, I agree with you. I am hopeful that there will be environmental benefits along the way, especially if we can do away with the "multi use" plastic bags that will continue to wreak havoc in our waterways, but.. if this were a decision based on environmentalism, why have both major grocery chains since run promotions that included handing out little bits of plastic with purchase? I saw a story a little while ago about those dreadful Coles stikeez washing up on beaches *sigh*

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

oh good point! I've never looked too hard at the stikeez but they seem very kitchy and annoying, and yeah, if one gets one every time they go to the store they're probably consumering more plastic than they would have in the eliminated plastic bags.

Actually, literally literally, conspiracy theory here, what if their supplier had already bought up the plastic to make the usual amount of bags they would need, and when the bag ban came down they were like "what are we going to do with this plastic???" and came up with the stikeez??

[thismaz.livejournal.com]

It's about reducing single use plastics, without having to wait for the manufacturing infrastructure to re-engineer itself. Plus, biodegradable plastics are still more expensive to produce. It's Nudge Theory. You wouldn't get such a change from the supply side, so encourage change on the demand side.
Now people habitually bring study bags to the supermarket. (I keep mine by the front door.) The number of single use bags consumed has reduced dramatically in the UK and there are far fewer tatty fragments of plastic carrier bags caught in bushes by the roadside. Everybody saves money except the plastic manufacturers, who switch to making other things - the supermarkets don't need to buy so many plastic bags that they then 'give away', the government gets some additional tax income from the single use bags that are still sold (for 5p in the UK) and everybody gets a nice comfortable glow of satisfaction, knowing they are doing their bit for the environment. What's not to like.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

What's not to like is that in practice the end result is me usually with an armful of groceries lol.

Thanks for the explanation though.

[thismaz.livejournal.com]

Do what I do when I forget - take the stuff out to the car in the trolley and load it into the boot (sorry - trunk *g*) loose.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Even with ample bags since I'm feeding just myself I never have a cartful, though Ii guess there's no rule against using a cart for just a small load. But now that they seem to regularly have card board boxes on offer I think I might be often taking cardboard boxes ... they seem good for transfering deliveries of honey jars ;)

[bearshorty.livejournal.com]

They just banned single use plastic bags in New York apparently,  according to my Dad but I'm not sure when it will take effect. My problem is that I use all those bags as garbage bags - we don't just throw them out empty. So I will have to figure out that now on top of carrying bags for groceries.

[wantedonvoyage.livejournal.com]

I'm against it. It will be around for hundreds of years after being used for less than an hour. We have more of them in circulation than we will ever need. I tried to go all of Lent without accepting a single new bag (and unlike there, we went through a half-hearted attempt to convince customers to use re-usable bags and then went right back to giving out free ones. In fact the one grocery store seems like the checkers have a contest to see who can send a customer out with the most bags. They'll take a gallon milk jug, which has a handle, and put it in two bags "because it's heavy".

However, like you, I end up without one sometimes. My MO is to put them on the door handle after emptying them so that I am forced to look at it on the way out to the car, and thus might think to take it with me even if I'm not going shopping.

I read that they were going to make bags out of corn husks that would dissipate as quickly as you describe (and also give more money to our already highly-subsidized monocrop industrial ag) but I don't think anything came of it. As long as it's cheap to give away bags, they'll keep doing it.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

oh that's a good idea actually to put them on the door handle so I'll remember to take them out to the car!

[wantedonvoyage.livejournal.com]

I could suggest dropping your keys in one of the bags so you can't leave without them, but I'd be the one who tore the whole house up looking for his keys because he forgot he did that.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Haha I regularly employ the key strategy if I'm at a restaurant and set my hat on the seat beside me (because only a madman eats with a hat on), I set my car keys in my hat so I can't possibly forget it.

[ryl.livejournal.com]

I've been shopping at Aldi so long I've gotten myself trained to keep my bags in the backseat (and a quarter in the console) and get them out when I get to the store. I only have the one car I drive, though, so I don't have to worry about getting caught out in a work vehicle.

The other store I go to, Ingles, still has the single-use plastic bags. I get a couple of those on my weekly shop each time and use them to as trash can liners and cat litter bags. Still, they do tend to pile up. My solution is to cut them into strips and crochet them into net bags which get added to my Aldi Bag stash.

I'd use the reusable bags at Ingles as well but their self-checkouts are stupid when you try to use your own bag. Also, I need some kind of bag when I scoop the catbox.

[pondhopper.livejournal.com]

It always catches me by surprise when I learn that places other than Europe are just now catching up with the bring your own bag concept. Though it was more recently legislated here (ie you now pay for plastic bags), the concept of using your own reusable shopping bags (cloth, net, raffia, etc) here has been around seemingly forever. Truthfully, I don't see the shops here selling that many plastic bags any longer even though they're available. But of course, carrier bags are but a drop in the bucket of plastic use, really. Still, I have a shelf full of nice, big and strong carrier bags and it's almost reflex to just grab the bags on the way out to do shopping. It's a win-win situation all around and there really are far fewer plastic bags around these days.

[maju01.livejournal.com]

The major supermarkets in our area (Safeway, Shoppers, Giant) still give out plastic bags but we shop at a more "environmentally conscious" place which encourages the use of reusable bags. I've been making and using my own cloth bags for more than a decade, so it's an ingrained habit now. We hang the bags on the front door handle when we've unpacked the groceries, so they always get back to the car before the next grocery shopping.

The place we buy groceries supplies produce bags made of some kind of biodegradable plastic; they are just barely strong enough to get the produce home before they tear, and sometimes they don't even last that long, but in general they do the job.

[ravenfeather.livejournal.com]

We are moving toward "no plastic bags" but not there yet. I have shallow boxes that I load my bagged groceries into since it helps me get them into the cabin easily. They stay in my car, so I figure I am not going to have much of a problem with the transition, when it comes. I also have cloth and net grocery bags that are currently holding storage items that I can empty and use as grocery bags.

I personally don't like the plastic bags, even though we can still recycle them at walmart (to make more bags). I wold like to see us go back to recycled paper, since it is useful in the garden if you don't recycle it for more paper. Yes, I know... trees. We need to stop cutting down trees, and I don't have an answer to that.

An answer IMO is a bag that quickly dissolves in water, into natural, non toxic, non altering components.

[mdlbear]

Around here (San Jose, Seattle, etc.) they give you a 5-cent discount for every bag you bring. They also give you the option of plastic or paper; when I forget to bring bags or run over I ask for paper because I can use paper bags to carry stuff to the recycling center.

Of course, every grocery store also has store-logo reusable bags, usually for $0.99 or so, prominently on display right in front of the checkout counter.

[jaiden-s.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's another way to nickle and dime the consumer. That and self-checkout lines. I'm all for conservation, but it seems to me that a recyclable paper bag offered for free would be better.

[pundigrion.livejournal.com]

They outlawed them here, but usually it is paper bag you get if you pay. Otherwise you can buy a cloth bag at the till, although those always look like potato quality bags to me so I bring my own. I'm hippy enough to be pretty used to bringing my own though! Also I walk a lot and mine is stronger and more comfortable anyhow.

[xxmadsenxx.livejournal.com]

I don't know if I've ever seen a thicker plastic bag like the one you described. Where I live, they sell cloth totes. But of course I forget to bring them a lot of the time, if I don't put them back in my car, and go home with a bunch of wasteful grocery bags.

[newwaytowrite.livejournal.com]

We use cloth bags constantly. We were in the habit for so long it was of no consequence when the stores started charging for plastic bags. Sadly many people are willing to part with their money for bags. I find the plastic bags at grocery stores to be entirely useless for a garbage can. We use one large garbage bag every two weeks. Which is great as we have garbage pick every two weeks. Food waste is picked up every week and compostable bags are required for that bin.

Since we have to drive pretty much everywhere we have a soft sided cooler in each car and take an ice pack on every trip out because you never know when you might decide to get farm eggs, milk or something on a non grocery/errand day. We have more than enough bags in each car that if we forget one in the house we are just fine but we tend to put them back every time because we don’t leave the cool in the house to avoid it from becoming a cat bed.

[selucius.livejournal.com]

They tried to ban plastic bags in Austin. The sturdier ones available for purchase were 25 cents. It only lasted about a year before some state authority kicked in and said they couldn't do that.

[richaarde.livejournal.com]

California pointed to the fact that urban tumbleweeds have nearly disappeared since they forced retailers to start selling the thicker bags instead of giving them away for free.

The statistic I’ve heard is that a paper bag takes 4x as much water and 20x as much energy to produce. And a paper bag made of recycled material is not as strong as a bag made of virgin fiber.

Biodegradable plastic also hasn’t worked as well in practice as had been hoped.

It all basically points back to getting people to use reusable bags. I know it’s a pain in the ass, but it really is the best way.

[furzicle.livejournal.com]

I used to see reusing plastic bags from my foreign trips as a cool souvenir activity. (Hence I have plastic grocery bags from Germany, Norway, Iceland...) So I still have those but actually rarely use them.

One year, I decided to hand out holiday gifts (i.e. jam, cookies, etc) to family members in reusable grocery bags. Good idea, but some people didn't want them. Presently, I have an overabundance of reusable "cloth" bags and try to put them in the car and drive around town with them all the time.

I also frequently just push my entire cart of groceries out to the car and load everything into the back, sans bags. It works fine. Your cardboard box strategy sounds wise.

I also wonder why they're trying to reduce plastic use by selling you plastic bags that are probably DOUBLE the quantity of plastic of the original ones.

Trader Joe's now offers "compostable" plastic bags for produce. However, I think you need some specialized place to put those for actual composting. TJs needs to add that service as well.

And this is all in southern California, where reusable bags are now the expected norm by most shoppers.