6 ms·

Same in Canada. The reusable bags that the stores sell are 5-20$. You get hit once with that and you'll start bringing your own bags. It's actually really simp

Same in Canada. The reusable bags that the stores sell are 5-20$. You get hit once with that and you'll start bringing your own bags. It's actually really simple to influence human behavior with pricing!

Eddy_Viscosity2 2y ago
Its not all great, these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills. People forget to bring them, or make an unplanned stop to the grocery store to pick up a few things and buy a new bag. Then at home the bags pile up and get thrown out. Many are barely 'reusable', the are crap and don't get used again an get thrown out (my favorite are the ikea bags, they are big and great for groceries - vs many grocery store offerings which are garbage). Nutshell, it they may not be a net plus for the environment when so many poor quality bags which are more energy/resource intensive to make end up being single-use anyway.
- maccard 2y ago
  Have you a source for this? Because all the published info I’ve seen says that it is great and it works as intended.
  - alistairSH 2y ago
    https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11367-021-01946-6 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11367-021-01946-6 I've seen several studies that dispute the efficacy of reusable plastic items (bags, cups, etc). The energy costs of producing the "sturdy" alternative are often high enough to offset the gain in reuse. IIRC, one study showed that reusing the single-use grocery bag one time (as a trash bin liner) was enough to put it back ahead of the typical $1 reusable bags available at the check-out counter at most grocers.
    - Tagbert 2y ago
      Since reusable bags have so little mass, I am not so concerned about the energy use to produce. More about the amount of bags and micro-plastics that escape into the environment.
      - alistairSH 2y ago
        That's fair. And I'm definitely in favor of doing whatever's best for the environment. Just pointing out that it's not as simple as "reusable is better" - depending on the set of metrics being measured, it might not be.
    - maccard 2y ago
      That doesnt back up your claim of these reusable bags piling up in landfills, it says it’s not as clean cut as it being better.
      - alistairSH 2y ago
        I never claimed they're filling up landfills, that was somebody else. I was just providing some more context, which as you note, indicates it's not as simple as "reusable good, one-use bad".
- dougdimmadome 2y ago
  everyone I know has a bag of "bag for life" bags, and yes sometimes you forget to bring them and you end up buying more. but they're definitely a net good. the amount of bags sold to people who forgot theirs is orders of magnitude than the number of bags that would be handed out when they were free. I was shocked recently when I visited a shop in another european country and they had regular non-reusable bags, it seemed so primitive! > Many are barely 'reusable', the are crap and don't get used again an get thrown out there are thinner plastic ones, but even the lightest "reusable" bags we have last for months if not years. unless you're buying pineapples and throwing stars every time you shop they should last you a while.
  - ImHereToVote 2y ago
    > and they had regular non-reusable bags, it seemed so primitive! It's all about vibes with you people.
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  > these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills Can you cite where this is happening?
- jackcnreturns 2y ago
  [dead]
- Workaccount2 2y ago
  The killer is grocery delivery services. They got wrapped up in the legislation, so they must deliver groceries in reusable bags. It's totally impractical to come an collect the bags again (collect, clean, sort), so instead our small office, for instance, goes through about a dozen of them a month.
  - ImHereToVote 2y ago
    It's all so tiring. Make packaging from manufacturers biodegradable by law. Why is the consumer burdened with these decisions? Is this some sort of deranged lobbying scheme?
  - camtarn 2y ago
    Over here in the UK, our grocery delivery service (Sainsburys) just comes to your door with flat crates full of unbagged shopping. You meet them at the door and transfer the shopping into your own bags. It's a lot slower than just grabbing bagged shopping out of the crates, and I have no idea how it works for folks in flats/apartments (do the delivery folks have to walk each crate up four flights of stairs individually?) but it is nice that it doesn't cause as much direct waste. Albeit that it might cause indirect waste due to now needing more vans on the road to service the same number of users, hm.
    - jstanley 2y ago
      You can carry the crate to the kitchen and dump out the contents on your worktop/floor. No need for the intermediate bagging! I agree things were easier when they delivered it in bags though.
      - ssl-3 2y ago
        With the way groceries are usually packed (with smashables like bread and milk on top), that sounds like a good way to accidentally make French toast.
  - chipdart 2y ago
    > The killer is grocery delivery services. I don't think so. This is largely dependant on each grocery delivery service, but of you look at it the worst cases are actually just continuing business as usual,which is hardly a regression. In the meantime, some services managed to completely eliminate the use of plastic bags. As an example, for the past year or so I had a groceries delivery service use their old plastic bags, but they also implemented a charge-back service where they pay you back when/if you return them in the following delivery. This is clearly an improvement. In the meantime I had competing supermarket chains completely switch away from single-use bags to alternatives such as reusable plastic crates and even reusable cardboard crates. Behemoths such as Amazon Fresh completely switched to a mix of paper bags, for example.
- vlachen 2y ago
  There are ways to get around the "oh crap, I forgot the bags" depending on how the store does things. For example, the Aldi stores I shop at in the US have a couple of cages with empty boxes in them. The boxes on the shelves get emptied and then the employees round them up and drop them in accessible cages/crates. This allows a person to choose to either buy a paper bag, buy a reusable bag, or make due with a couple of free boxes that were going to be disposed of anyways.
  - michael_vo 2y ago
    costco has been doing this since the beginning!
    - vlachen 2y ago
      Not something I have in my area, so I have no experience with Costco.
  - ssl-3 2y ago
    That may vary by location. The Aldi I usually go to has staff that are so ridiculously efficient that there are nearly zero empty boxes on the shelves, and the rolling "box cage" is nearly always tucked away somewhere unseen unless they're actively using it. This isn't a complaint. It's a nice place to shop, and the stock is always very orderly compared to some other locations. But GFS? They've got boxes at the checkout. I think the expectation is that the customer is supposed to box their own stuff, but they always do it for me if there isn't a line.
    - vlachen 2y ago
      My love of Aldi comes from the fact that my attention isn't being accosted as soon as I walk in the door. It's the stuff I need, without advertisements, screens, music, etc. The price doesn't hurt either. Before I began shopping there, I was exclusively at The Fresh Market, so when I switched, my grocery bill was cut by 2/3.
      - 2y ago
- chipdart 2y ago
  > Its not all great, these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills. People forget to bring them, or make an unplanned stop to the grocery store to pick up a few things and buy a new bag. Then at home the bags pile up and get thrown out. Your comment is a textbook argument of perfect being the enemy of good. Sure, some bags are thrown out. Sure, people use more than one. Sure, people can buy them if they feel they need them. That's perfectly fine, as that's completely besides the point. What you're failing to mention is that thanks to this push to adopt reusable bags the use of single-use plastic bags plummeted. You no longer see over a dozen single-use bags being thrown out at each and every single shopping trip. These bags aren't recyclable and disintegrate very easily, making it extremely hard to pull them out of the environment once they get there. You're also somehow leaving out is the fact that some major supermarkets chains are making available reusable shopping bags made of natural fiber. It's not a given that you're replacing large volumes of single-use plastic with small volumes of reusable plastic, as you're also seeing small volumes of natural fabric being used. You're also leaving out the fact that this push is taking single-use plastic out of the market but nothing forces customers to adopt the store's own offerings. Anyone is able to buy whatever type of shopping bag suits their fancy. So no, you're not seeing plastic being replaced with plastic. You're seeing drastic reductions in plastic use by eliminating perverse incentives to consume single-use plastic containers, and the adoption of substitute goods that have a far preferable environmental footprint.
  - coryrc 2y ago
    Why care if they get thrown out? If you are the median American, you burnt (aka "disposed of in the atmosphere") far more petroleum driving to the store than a hundred single-use bags. I bet a single bag is of comparable volume to tire wear. Get off your high horse and start focusing on real problems. Automobiles are responsible for more micro-plastics than single-use items, plus 6PPD poisoning us. Single-use plastics are just a useful tool to distract from the real sources of pollution.
    - michael_vo 2y ago
      I've heard this argument before and totally agree that single use plastics are a tiny fraction of the total problem. But as a Canadian I like that the law forced me to think about my consumption habits, as well as it helped create conversation topics with other people.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills. People forget to bring them, or make an unplanned stop to the grocery store to pick up a few things and buy a new bag Put a tax on them that funds an environmental initiative, whether that be decarbonisation, trash clean-up or better landfill management.
Tagbert 2y ago
you should shop around. I see the heavy plastic bags in the US$2-5 range. Check out Trader Joe's if you have them. I've been using the same couple of TJ bags for years.
JadeNB 2y ago
> Same in Canada. The reusable bags that the stores sell are 5-20$. Cents, not dollars, right?

Eddy_Viscosity2 2y ago

Its not all great, these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills. People forget to bring them, or make an unplanned stop to the grocery store to pick up a few things and buy a new bag. Then at home the bags pile up and get thrown out. Many are barely 'reusable', the are crap and don't get used again an get thrown out (my favorite are the ikea bags, they are big and great for groceries - vs many grocery store offerings which are garbage). Nutshell, it they may not be a net plus for the environment when so many poor quality bags which are more energy/resource intensive to make end up being single-use anyway.

maccard 2y ago
Have you a source for this? Because all the published info I’ve seen says that it is great and it works as intended.
- alistairSH 2y ago
  https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11367-021-01946-6 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11367-021-01946-6 I've seen several studies that dispute the efficacy of reusable plastic items (bags, cups, etc). The energy costs of producing the "sturdy" alternative are often high enough to offset the gain in reuse. IIRC, one study showed that reusing the single-use grocery bag one time (as a trash bin liner) was enough to put it back ahead of the typical $1 reusable bags available at the check-out counter at most grocers.
  - Tagbert 2y ago
    Since reusable bags have so little mass, I am not so concerned about the energy use to produce. More about the amount of bags and micro-plastics that escape into the environment.
    - alistairSH 2y ago
      That's fair. And I'm definitely in favor of doing whatever's best for the environment. Just pointing out that it's not as simple as "reusable is better" - depending on the set of metrics being measured, it might not be.
  - maccard 2y ago
    That doesnt back up your claim of these reusable bags piling up in landfills, it says it’s not as clean cut as it being better.
    - alistairSH 2y ago
      I never claimed they're filling up landfills, that was somebody else. I was just providing some more context, which as you note, indicates it's not as simple as "reusable good, one-use bad".
dougdimmadome 2y ago
everyone I know has a bag of "bag for life" bags, and yes sometimes you forget to bring them and you end up buying more. but they're definitely a net good. the amount of bags sold to people who forgot theirs is orders of magnitude than the number of bags that would be handed out when they were free. I was shocked recently when I visited a shop in another european country and they had regular non-reusable bags, it seemed so primitive! > Many are barely 'reusable', the are crap and don't get used again an get thrown out there are thinner plastic ones, but even the lightest "reusable" bags we have last for months if not years. unless you're buying pineapples and throwing stars every time you shop they should last you a while.
- ImHereToVote 2y ago
  > and they had regular non-reusable bags, it seemed so primitive! It's all about vibes with you people.
robertlagrant 2y ago
> these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills Can you cite where this is happening?
jackcnreturns 2y ago
[dead]
Workaccount2 2y ago
The killer is grocery delivery services. They got wrapped up in the legislation, so they must deliver groceries in reusable bags. It's totally impractical to come an collect the bags again (collect, clean, sort), so instead our small office, for instance, goes through about a dozen of them a month.
- ImHereToVote 2y ago
  It's all so tiring. Make packaging from manufacturers biodegradable by law. Why is the consumer burdened with these decisions? Is this some sort of deranged lobbying scheme?
- camtarn 2y ago
  Over here in the UK, our grocery delivery service (Sainsburys) just comes to your door with flat crates full of unbagged shopping. You meet them at the door and transfer the shopping into your own bags. It's a lot slower than just grabbing bagged shopping out of the crates, and I have no idea how it works for folks in flats/apartments (do the delivery folks have to walk each crate up four flights of stairs individually?) but it is nice that it doesn't cause as much direct waste. Albeit that it might cause indirect waste due to now needing more vans on the road to service the same number of users, hm.
  - jstanley 2y ago
    You can carry the crate to the kitchen and dump out the contents on your worktop/floor. No need for the intermediate bagging! I agree things were easier when they delivered it in bags though.
    - ssl-3 2y ago
      With the way groceries are usually packed (with smashables like bread and milk on top), that sounds like a good way to accidentally make French toast.
- chipdart 2y ago
  > The killer is grocery delivery services. I don't think so. This is largely dependant on each grocery delivery service, but of you look at it the worst cases are actually just continuing business as usual,which is hardly a regression. In the meantime, some services managed to completely eliminate the use of plastic bags. As an example, for the past year or so I had a groceries delivery service use their old plastic bags, but they also implemented a charge-back service where they pay you back when/if you return them in the following delivery. This is clearly an improvement. In the meantime I had competing supermarket chains completely switch away from single-use bags to alternatives such as reusable plastic crates and even reusable cardboard crates. Behemoths such as Amazon Fresh completely switched to a mix of paper bags, for example.
vlachen 2y ago
There are ways to get around the "oh crap, I forgot the bags" depending on how the store does things. For example, the Aldi stores I shop at in the US have a couple of cages with empty boxes in them. The boxes on the shelves get emptied and then the employees round them up and drop them in accessible cages/crates. This allows a person to choose to either buy a paper bag, buy a reusable bag, or make due with a couple of free boxes that were going to be disposed of anyways.
- michael_vo 2y ago
  costco has been doing this since the beginning!
  - vlachen 2y ago
    Not something I have in my area, so I have no experience with Costco.
- ssl-3 2y ago
  That may vary by location. The Aldi I usually go to has staff that are so ridiculously efficient that there are nearly zero empty boxes on the shelves, and the rolling "box cage" is nearly always tucked away somewhere unseen unless they're actively using it. This isn't a complaint. It's a nice place to shop, and the stock is always very orderly compared to some other locations. But GFS? They've got boxes at the checkout. I think the expectation is that the customer is supposed to box their own stuff, but they always do it for me if there isn't a line.
  - vlachen 2y ago
    My love of Aldi comes from the fact that my attention isn't being accosted as soon as I walk in the door. It's the stuff I need, without advertisements, screens, music, etc. The price doesn't hurt either. Before I began shopping there, I was exclusively at The Fresh Market, so when I switched, my grocery bill was cut by 2/3.
    - 2y ago
chipdart 2y ago
> Its not all great, these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills. People forget to bring them, or make an unplanned stop to the grocery store to pick up a few things and buy a new bag. Then at home the bags pile up and get thrown out. Your comment is a textbook argument of perfect being the enemy of good. Sure, some bags are thrown out. Sure, people use more than one. Sure, people can buy them if they feel they need them. That's perfectly fine, as that's completely besides the point. What you're failing to mention is that thanks to this push to adopt reusable bags the use of single-use plastic bags plummeted. You no longer see over a dozen single-use bags being thrown out at each and every single shopping trip. These bags aren't recyclable and disintegrate very easily, making it extremely hard to pull them out of the environment once they get there. You're also somehow leaving out is the fact that some major supermarkets chains are making available reusable shopping bags made of natural fiber. It's not a given that you're replacing large volumes of single-use plastic with small volumes of reusable plastic, as you're also seeing small volumes of natural fabric being used. You're also leaving out the fact that this push is taking single-use plastic out of the market but nothing forces customers to adopt the store's own offerings. Anyone is able to buy whatever type of shopping bag suits their fancy. So no, you're not seeing plastic being replaced with plastic. You're seeing drastic reductions in plastic use by eliminating perverse incentives to consume single-use plastic containers, and the adoption of substitute goods that have a far preferable environmental footprint.
- coryrc 2y ago
  Why care if they get thrown out? If you are the median American, you burnt (aka "disposed of in the atmosphere") far more petroleum driving to the store than a hundred single-use bags. I bet a single bag is of comparable volume to tire wear. Get off your high horse and start focusing on real problems. Automobiles are responsible for more micro-plastics than single-use items, plus 6PPD poisoning us. Single-use plastics are just a useful tool to distract from the real sources of pollution.
  - michael_vo 2y ago
    I've heard this argument before and totally agree that single use plastics are a tiny fraction of the total problem. But as a Canadian I like that the law forced me to think about my consumption habits, as well as it helped create conversation topics with other people.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> these reusable bags are starting to fill up in landfills. People forget to bring them, or make an unplanned stop to the grocery store to pick up a few things and buy a new bag Put a tax on them that funds an environmental initiative, whether that be decarbonisation, trash clean-up or better landfill management.

Tagbert 2y ago

you should shop around. I see the heavy plastic bags in the US$2-5 range. Check out Trader Joe's if you have them. I've been using the same couple of TJ bags for years.

JadeNB 2y ago

> Same in Canada. The reusable bags that the stores sell are 5-20$. Cents, not dollars, right?