Shopping with Reusable Grocery Bags

This isn’t a new one. In Des Moines, I regularly shopped with reusable bags. I have a handy little one that folds up in its own pouch and fits in my purse, so I’m never without one when I get in the checkout line. And I have a couple of other trusty bags I’ve acquired—one from a grocery in California during our girls’ trip through Wine Country, another a shopping bag from my sister’s store, lululemon, that is, of course, covered in inspiration sayings about living life to the fullest and flossing—that can be loaded with tons of stuff.

It took a while, but by the time I left Des Moines I rarely got funny looks when I loaded up reusable bags at the store. The biggest challenge was getting sackers (is that the correct term?) to fill the bags as full as possible. For some reason, there's this mentality among people bagging groceries that placing more than four items in one bag is bad for business. So it took a while to break them of the notion that they could fill my reusable bags up—really fill them up—and not use any plastic bags at all. And, now that I've left Des Moines, the grocery stores themselves are realizing the power of reusable bags and are selling their own.

But now, sadly, I’m starting from scratch. When I moved to small-town Illinois, I knew from my first foray at the grocery store that reusable bags would be a foreign concept.

The people at the checkout look at me like I'm crazy when I place the bags down with my groceries. They'll throw a couple of items in each, then whip out their trusty plastic sacks to take care of the rest. At first I was hesitant to say anything—when you're new in a small town, you don't want to piss off the people at the grocery store! So now I try, very politely of course, to say, "Go ahead and fill them up as much as you can." I think I might have to get a bit more firm with them on this point though, because every time I go armed with all three of my reusable bags I still end up coming home with at least two plastic sacks. And it's not necessary.

The worst was the other day, when a woman at IGA placed each piece of produce in an individual plastic sack, then placed it in my reusable bag. I don't put my fruits and veggies in those clear plastic baggies in the produce section—they're hearty little creatures who don't need that level of protection to get home, and I'm going to wash them anyway. But she wasn't having it. So she made sure every last apple and zucchini was covered fully before it went into the reusable bag. And she even—accidentally—stuck about six extra plastic sacks in the bag too. Great. Just what I needed.

And so the ever-expanding sack of plastic sacks in the cupboard is growing, much to my chagrin.

One of the very customer-friendly things IGA does is have high school kids who will sack your groceries and carry them to your car for you. One day, as one such kid was carrying my reusable shopping bags to the Aztek, he asked me why I used them. I made some general remark along the lines of, "Oh, they're easier to carry and then I don't have all those plastic grocery sacks piling up at my house."

"Oh," he said, as he placed the bags on the seat of the car. "I thought maybe it was because you were one of those environmentalists."

To which I laughed. "Oh, yeah, that too."

He headed back in the store without another word.

It's true that my reusable shopping bags with their nice long shoulder straps are easier to carry. And they hold a lot more food than the average plastic sack. Plus they do prevent that massive buildup of plastic sacks in the cupboard from growing any more than it already has.

But it's also because plastic and paper sacks both have a considerable—and unnecessary—impact on the environment.

Both paper and plastic require major resources for production—and most end up in landfills or litter the side of the road after they’re used. In fact, each year Americans toss an estimated 100 billion plastic bags—and less than one percent are recycled.

And that's just the effect of the bags after they're produced—it doesn't even take into account the impact producing those bags (which require plenty of oil for plastic and wood for paper) have on the environment. This Washington Post graphic provides a nice breakdown of the impact each has in regard to consumption, production, pollution, and more.

Don't have your reusable bag yet? What are you waiting for! If your grocery store doesn't sell them (although many are starting to—even Target!), you can always buy one from reusablebags.com. Or better yet, just use a canvas tote or whatever other bag you might already have at home.

Oh, and if my arguments are falling on deaf ears, think about this: Wouldn't you look so much cooler carrying a bag like the one shown above (photo by inju) rather than a crappy plastic bag? (Sadly, sometimes you have to do what you can when the environment argument falls on deaf ears.)