Saturday, November 8, 2008

Plastic Bag Outing

Amy Jo made some good comments about reusable bags below. Why don't stores give you reusable bags free if they really want to help the environment? I never buy them because I refuse to pay them money for something that is saving them money anyway. Except for the cooler-like Trader Joes bag that was a dollar and I thought I would like to keep cold stuff in it on my long drive home. I might add that it annoys me on the floorboard or trunk of my car because it is always in the way and I still manage to forget to use it. It is late so it is okay if I am not making sense.

Here is my thing about the plastic bags the grocery stores give out. I use them. I couldn't live without them. I carry them around for dirty diapers, I put them in my bathroom trashcans, I carry stuff in them, I end up returning stuff to stores in them and you see this list goes on and on. They were essential in the early weeks of pregnancy. Just this month I have grabbed them a couple of times on the way out the door thinking that one of my children or myself would be throwing up in the car. Gross, yes, but true! I was so thankful last month when I had one for my four year old to puke in. I wasn't so happy when he dropped the bag and it went all over my car anyway. That is another story.

I think I would like for someone to make the plastic bags more biodegradable and that would work out for me just fine.

If you are mad about this whole plastic bag thing, you can submit your pictures of how they are ruining the earth here. If you would like to take a plastic bag and place it in your Azalea bush and take a picture for submission...I don't know how they would ever know you did it.

I found some websites that sell reusable, biodegradable bags. The problem is that they cost upwards of $35 and I just can't do that to you. If I am putting grocery bags in my bathroom trashcan, do you think I am going to buy a $35 bag? I do like this website that goes into more options for being a better consumer (than me) if you would like to check it out (ignore any $50 bags mentioned).

All that being said, I really like this little bag from The Container Store. It folds up into its own little pouch and is under $10. Yeah. I still don't want anyone to throw up in it so I might occasionally tuck a plastic bag inside.
I'm thinking about getting the red one.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Those are really cute....at least you are using the grocery store bags and not just tossing them :)

MJacobson said...

And for us cat owners, we use them for scooping the litter box. They still end up in a land fill but at least I get two uses out of them. I don't know what the answer is.

Kristin said...

I know...this really bothers me. I love to recycle, but as I said in your previous post, I would have to buy 10 bags for my Target visits. Who only fills one bag at Target?!? I try to do my part the majority of the time. I heard someone say on Oprah that if you use one less napkin a day, you could save a lot of trees. So I have been saving my napkins in my reusable lunch bag until it is noticeably used. You know, that sounds awful now that I am writing it! But I really don't eat anything messy for lunch, I promise. ;)

L a u r a said...

When we were in Canada a couple of months ago, we had to buy each plastic bag at the grocery store--and put loonie ($1 coin) deposit into the cart corral to even use a cart.

Since they make you guess how many bags you'll use before they start scanning your items, I was improving my estimating and spatial skills while thinking about being more frugal! That was a fun challenge. It did make me think about the things I take for granted here in the States.

I think the stores are also just making the plastic bags inferior so eventually we won't even want to use them. Our grocery bags are not vomit worthy and have even been seemingly tearing more frequently.

They'll get us to stop relying on them soon. Now, Target has to stop making such NICE plastic bags. I consider them my *good* bags. ;)

L a u r a said...

Just another thought...why don't more stores do like Costco--use the boxes the food comes in to pack it up for us? My kids really dig boxes!

Lisa, we never had Webvan (Dallas did though), but I believe all their crates are still out there somewhere.

Amazon has fresh food delivery in Seattle. Maybe they're planning to expand soon!