The difference between European countries and America is becoming so stark. Anyone reading or watching global news has to see how backwards this country is and that it’s only getting worse.
The difference between European countries and America is becoming so stark. Anyone reading or watching global news has to see how backwards this country is and that it’s only getting worse.
Wait till you hear about the plastic bag crazy. Pretty much all the chains got rid of them in my area and began selling the reusable bags. At about 2.50 each. One store I liked used to have old cardboard boxes but they want you to buy the reusable bags as they make about 2 dollars in profit per bag and the average costumer buys 1 bag per 100 in groceries. That alone is a2% increase on average in profits for the grocery chain. That is huge for them.
Worse is that they take about 50 times the energy to produce and they figure the average bag is only used 5 times before they end in a land fill. The net result is a 2.5% increase in your grocery bill and almost 10 times the increase in GHG compared to a plastic bag.
Who throws out reusable bags after 5? I’ve had the same set of cloth bags for like 15 years!
It’s worse… sometimes you forget your bag or go to buy something unplanned. And after a decade you have more reusable bags at home than you will ever be able to use up in your life.
Yeah we try to keep at least three in both cars at all times to avoid that!
Same here. My oldest are about 18 years old now. And I use them for everything, not only to go shopping. I have the feeling they don’t understand the reuse part of reusable.
Statically the majority. Supermarkets are selling a bag per about 100 in purchases. From that you can deduce that the majority of people are only using them a few times.
UK supermarkets sold 1.5 billion reusable bags in 2019. That is 57 per household per year.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/13/world/reusable-grocery-bags-cotton-plastic-scn/index.html
I’ve been using the same set of bags for 8 years now. That’s a whole lot of plastic reduced.
Your one of the rare ones. Overall it has been far worse which is concerning. Now that the supermarkets know they can make a fairly significant profits as well, they are quite happy to sell extra bags.
In 2019 UK supermarkets sold 1.5 billion reusable bags. That is 57 per household. Greenpeace estimated you need to reuse a cotton bag some 7100 times before it is the equivalent of plastic. I hope you did not buy cotton as you likely will need to have those bags for life to offset the energy needed to produce them.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/13/world/reusable-grocery-bags-cotton-plastic-scn/index.html
One of the bags is made by my daughter from reused cotton and the other two are made from hemp.
It’s not only about energy though. For me it was about not using plastic anymore.
And to be fair, the tote my daughter made is just superior. I love it. It has a square base with some straps sewn on the inside of the walls to fixate bottles and four handles, two long for shoulder carry and two shorter for regular carry.
It good you are trusting but that is not the norm. Plastic is ugly to be sure but it does not have a huge GHG impact which is the biggest threat by far at the moment. People should be encouraged to reuse to be sure but we definately should not enact policy that is overall far worse.
My wife and I have compact, roll up shopping bags, she always has one in her handbag, mine is in my backpack, for the past 10 years. The only time we used bags from a store was when we shopped for seafood in Hong Kong’s wet markets.
they did this in my area, except the chains retaliated by making their free disposable bags ‘reusable’ (re:thicker), which of course, no one ever does. the end result is the exact same problem only now worse because the bags take longer to decompose.
Around here it’s unthinkable to go to the store without your own bags. Depending on my load I take a backpack, folding boxes of the same set of cloth bags that I’ve been using for 8 years. It’s rare to se people buy a reusable plastic bag these days.
The sales in the supermarkets say different. Are you watching how many are sold each day?
UK households in average are using 57 a year. Someone is buying them.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/13/world/reusable-grocery-bags-cotton-plastic-scn/index.html
In 2018. Times have changed since then. The store that I frequent just doesn’t sell bags anymore, not even reusable. They sell a foldable cartboerd box if you really need something to carry your groceries. Most people who shop there use foldable crates. Those who don’t come by car use backpacks or those old lady shopping trolleys.
That is probably even worse. Cardboard is rarely recycled and also has a large environmental footprint. The stats are really saying otherwise particularly the profits the supermarket chains are making on this policy.
I just looked up the numbers for Belgium (where I live). A quick search so I only found some old data. Of the cardboard that is collected nearly 78% got recycled in 2012. I bet the figures are higher these days.
Yes of the cardboard that is recycled, 78% may end up as some new item. But I bet only 10% of actual cardboard actually ends up in recycling centers.
I don't know but most western European countries have high collection figures.
I bet you area goes to the cotton reusable at a few dollars each. Getting an extra percentage on your margin is huge for supermarkets even if it makes no environmental sense.
Alright, this is just some silly shit right here. I have 8-10 reusable bags in my car I use every time I go to the grocery store. I’ve been using them for years. I threw away one so far. Who the fuck only uses them 5x?
UK supermarkets stats in 2019 showed some 1.5 billion used in 2019. That is 57 or household every year. So the vast majority are just throwing them away. Most likely they just don’t want to carry them around and opt out to buy new ones. This is particularly likely if you use public transportation I suspect.
The “reusable” bags sold at supermarkets in Canada at least are really shitty. You’re lucky to get 5 uses before the handles rip off or groceries punch right through the flimsy plastic fabric.
If you’re serious about reusing bags you buy your own well made bags, but if you forgot to bring them or made an impulse buy congratulations, you now own a set of overpriced, very low quality bags… At least you’ll be rid of them in a week or two lol
I use them for tasks like giving away vegetables from my garden but honestly that was a fine use for the “non-reusable” bags, we reused them constantly. They even got recycled into deck boards, the new “reusable” ones just end up in the dump.
Walmart sells the shit ones that wouldn’t last in the US. Most places I go don’t. I wouldn’t buy those. Last time I went on vacation and didnt think to bring any I just didn’t use a bag and carried armfuls of groceries in instead of buying that flimsy crap.
I don’t understand people who live in areas that don’t allow plastic bags anymore who wouldn’t think to buy some decent ones. They just go back in my car after I unload groceries and they last for years. It’s such a weird thing to not be able to handle.
Who cares about GHG for bags? The goal is to reduce waste, so you should evaluate it based on the amount of materials used.
Far more material is used in reusable bags and they are thrown out far earlier than it takes to cover the equivalent. Not only is this creating more GHG, it is also creating more tons of waste overall.
And GHG will kill us far sooner then plastic bags.
The marginal GHG from a thicker bag is completely and entirely negligible. The waste footprint is outsized given the GHG footprint.