How did the plastic grocery bag ban work out in your city?

Its workin well

I don't understand the need to ban those things. I reuse those little bags for a lot of stuff around the house. Plus, lots of the groceries I buy are packaged in plastic anyway. Am I supposed to go back to glass milk bottles?

glass milk bottles would be a huge improvement. they actually have them in New England, though just a few companies. going back to reuseable is wise. The plastic bags pile up--you can get usually just one further use from them. Most end up in the garbage very soon. They don't biodegrade in a short amount of time. Cloth bags can be used many, many times until they tear. Among the other things to target are tiny plastic water bottles--totally unnecessary. And over-wrapping of foods.

The Coastal Bend area of Texas (roughly Corpus Christi) has plastic bag bans in place. The Texas legislature is moving to override local plastic bag bans to prevent "Californication" of Texas. But people in the Coastal Bend area strongly support the ban because plastic bags do substantial harm to coastal wildlife (sea turtles, fish, dolphins, etc.).

My plastic salad bar container with the plastic knife & fork wrapped in plastic and the plastic dressing packets, as well as my orange juice in a plastic bottle, and my loaf of bread in a plastic bag, milk in a plastic jug and cold cuts in plastic bags, all fit much better and stayed upright well in the paper bags.

There is no ban where I am.

I reuse most of my bags for picking up dog poop.

And I take my lunch in a reused bag and then put the trash in that before going to the trash bin.

If I didn't get plastic bags at the grocery sore I'd probably end up buying plastic bags in some form, but not as many as I get now form the store.

I very rarely throw out an empty plastic bag.

Star wrote:

There is no ban where I am.

I reuse most of my bags for picking up dog poop.

And I take my lunch in a reused bag and then put the trash in that before going to the trash bin.

If I didn't get plastic bags at the grocery sore I'd probably end up buying plastic bags in some form, but not as many as I get now form the store.

I very rarely throw out an empty plastic bag.

This has been exactly my experience as well.

We don't have such a ban in our area of FL but I wish we did. Yes, I re-use them around the house, but I could do without. My peeve is that most clerks will only put 1 or 2 items in each bag so you walk out with 8-10 bags. When I go to Publix where they still offer paper, I can put 3-4 times as many items in one bag. Then I re-use the paper bag for my paper recycling.

I have used my own cloth grocery bags for years. Most people are too lazy to do that.

MKE ADA wrote:

Star wrote:

There is no ban where I am.

I reuse most of my bags for picking up dog poop.

And I take my lunch in a reused bag and then put the trash in that before going to the trash bin.

If I didn't get plastic bags at the grocery sore I'd probably end up buying plastic bags in some form, but not as many as I get now form the store.

I very rarely throw out an empty plastic bag.

This has been exactly my experience as well.

Mine too, except I never throw them out. If they pile up, I recycle in the bin at the grocery store.

I was surprised the first time stores asked me to pay for paper bags but it wasn't an issue. I never use bags at Costco anyway, just cart the things to my car, into the trunk, and sometimes use boxes to carry the things in the house.

TJs was the first that didn't have bags but I didn't get much there and just carried it to the car. Walmart didn't have bags, so I carted the things to my car, got paper bags from the house, and carried the things in. Now I keep extra paper bags in the trunk. I'm happy to see the demise of so much excess throwaway plastic.

We have tax (5c) not a ban. People are fine with it. Many bring resueable, if not clerks fill up the bags since they cost 5c. I also use them for other stuff but still end up with way too many. I try to collect them and return them to the recycle bin in the grocery store.

My town does not allow them in recycling bins.

I reuse them as garbage bags, lunch bags, dirty diaper bags, and random crap bags (not in that order). Plus, it is way easier to make it from the car to the kitchen in one trip.

I hope they stick with clogging landfills and don't make us switch to killing trees!

PS- I do most of my big shopping at a Sam's Club anyway, which doesn't have paper OR plastic bags...

It's gross reusing these bags. Imagine the poor check out people having to reuse filthy bags over and over. I asked one guy at the register if it wasn't gross and he said even the canvas type are too often disgusting.

They don't disinfect the area from all these gross bags before you put your food down.

I use a couple cloth bags now.

I was in the altiplano of Bolivia last year and the shrubs out there -- miles away from civilization -- many had plastic bags stuck in them. They're everywhere.

Why the hand wringing over plastic bags when the biggest component of household trash is baby diapers, adult diapers, juice boxes, and milk cartons, and dog poop bags. Get your own sh**t together, you phoney young tree huggers, before you criticize others.

How did the plastic grocery bag ban work out in my city?

Last time I saw it, it was doing some sort of crossfit style work out.

Let me tell you, that bag was all SHREDDED man it was just sick!

Shopping carts all over the place. Can't plastic bag up the items to carry home, just throw them back in the cart and wheel the cart to the house. Wheel back a block toward the store and ditch it in the grass.

I think plastic bottles are a worse problem. I still shake my head when I see people buy stacks of bottled water every week. They've never heard of a filter?