Green Bags

In honor of Earth Day this week, I have decided to discuss the use of "green bags". No matter which store you purchase them at, we are all familiar with green bags. They have become a huge part of our daily lives.

I myself, have 4...my mom has many more. (Let me just say that when I forget to take mine in the store, I feel guilty...and my mom lectures me about saving the earth once I get home and she sees the dreaded plastic bags). Now, my mom is not a vegetarian, vegan or environmental lobbyist, but she believes in conserving where we can. Actually, she is a lot more vigilant than I am when it comes to recycling and other related issues. I am very proud of her...she even got the vocational school where she substitute teaches to institute a recycling program in each of their rooms and laboratories.

All of this preamble is of course leading somewhere...we had a discussion tonight over dinner regarding something that recently happened to her...and let me just say, it has happened to me a few times as well. At the checkout register, she handed the bagger her green bags to use. When she looked over, she noticed that the bagger was placing each of the purchased items in plastic bags AND THEN into the green bags. Now obviously, this defeats the entire purpose! She then asked him to remove everything and begin again, this time using ONLY her green bags.

This has happened to me countless times and I have actually spoken to someone in customer service at my neighborhood grocery store about this. She mentioned to me, that most of the employees in the bagging area are teenagers and they just don't know any better and she would use it as a training piece. Please understand that I meant no malice or ill-will towards the bagger, but really...the whole reason we pay for bags and bring them is to help our planet. I would encourage each of you to have the same conversation with your store if/when this happens to you. (Sidenote: when it happened to me and I had them remove everything from the plastic bags, I made sure they understood I didn't want them to discard the perfectly good bags...they should reuse them...if not that would also defeat the purpose of me having them take everything out of them).

Later in conversation, we wondered why everyone is not using green bags, since it is such a cost-effective & easy thing we can do to help save our planet. My solution: charge a nominal fee for use of disposable bags. (Have you ever been to Ikea? They charge for bags...I found this out the hard way one day!) In case you need another reason other than saving our planet, here's one: think of the savings that our grocery stores would have if they didn't have to provide bags & recycling services for the bags...now imagine what would happen if they saved that $$ and passed along the savings to you & me!

Anyhow, that is just the way I see it! What are your thoughts?

-Gina