i've stopped

[thebarber]

i don't know what things are like in your area, but here most grocery stores have a self-service checkout with between 4 and 8 registers for some DIY checkout action.

additionally stores, in an effort to make people go green, have been charging 5 cents each for plastic bags.

i always end up forgetting my canvas bags in the car or at home and i usually have a kid (or two) with me at the store.

well, ive stopped paying for bags. the self-checkout asks how many bags you're using when you go to pay, i will always say none. the grocery store has 1 person supervising 8 self checkout lanes and theyre usually busy with someone that isnt me....so i always hit NO BAGS. screw big business...i remember when bags were included..

anyone else adpoted this process?

[A-Dingo-Ate-My-Baby]

anyone else adpoted this process?

do you mean, adopted theft as routine ? can't say I have.

[Kal-El]

Vaguest thread title of all time. :tongue:

[thebarber]

do you mean, adopted theft as routine ? can't say I have.

lol, yes.

but no reaction on the grocery stores gouging people ever since toronto adpoted a 5c/bag law?... its standard practice in a LOT of stores in canada now to charge for bags....what a rip

[WeeYari]

^ don't ever attempt to shop at the RCSS in Milton. Ever since they built that one several years ago, they have never provided plastic bags period. That was even before the per bag surcharge was put in effect.

[silver_echo]

Wait, $0.05/ bag, for a plastic shopping bag? I would never agree to pay that. That is a bull$#!t charge, if I ever heard of one. Do they charge for paper bags, too? And how do they expect people to get their groceries home?

[WeeYari]

In situations where we are caught without our canvas bags, we do 'buy' whatever plastic bags we require. Use them for kitchen trash. Cheaper than buying Glad Kitchen Catchers, or similar product.

Posted on OPs identical thread over on MI:

Bag legislation
[edit]Bans
Plastic bags are either restricted or completely banned in over a quarter of the world's countries.[20] Belgium, Italy, Ireland and Hong Kong have legislation discouraging the use and encouraging the recycling of plastic bags by imposing a fixed or minimum levy for the supply of plastic bags or obliging retailers to recycle.[21][22][23] Italy banned plastic bags entirely in January 2011. In other jurisdictions, including Bangladesh, South Africa and three states/territories of Australia, plastic bags are banned.[24][25]
In the United States, bans have been imposed at the local level, starting with San Francisco in 2007. In 2008, Westport, Connecticut, banned plastic bags in grocery stores.[20][26] In 2009, Edmonds, Washington, banned plastic bags at retail stores.[27] In 2010, Los Angeles County; Brownsville, Texas; and Bethel, Alaska, approved similar bans.[28][29] During the first few months of 2011, bans went into effect in North Carolina’s Outerbanks Region, banning all plastic bags at all retailers.[30] On October 15, 2011, Portland, Oregon, instituted a ban on plastic bags, targeted at large volume supermarkets and retail outlets.[31] Seattle, Washington followed suit on December 19, 2011, when its city council voted unanimously to ban single-use plastic bags from groceries and other retail stores.[32] Similar bans at the municipality level have been imposed in India, Mexico and the UK.[21]
[edit]Taxes
A plastic bag levy introduced in Ireland in 2002 resulted in a reduction of over 90% in the issuing of plastic shopping bags;[33] the total reduction in plastic bag use was less than that due to increased use of commercial trash bin-liners in place of the free shopping bags previously used by many consumers. Sales of bin-liners have increased by 400% according to one industry source.[34] The "ban on free plastic bags" in China introduced in 2008 resulted in a reduction by two thirds.[35] In Taiwan, plastic bags from supermarkets and other shops cost NT$2. In Wales, a 5-pence charge has been enforced on all plastic shopping bags since 1 October 2011.[36]
In the United States, the California legislature rejected a 25-cent bag tax in June 2009.[37] In August 2009, Seattle voters rejected a 20-cent bag tax previously approved by city leaders.[38] A five-cent tax levied on plastic bags in Washington, DC in January 2010 resulted in a decrease in consumption from 22.5 million to 3 million bags in the first month alone.[39] A study issued by the non-profit group American for Tax Reform found that the District of Columbia’s five-cent bag tax had a disproportionate impact on the city’s poor and cost the city over 100 jobs.[40] In Virginia, various bills including a 20-cent and 5-cent bag tax failed to pass the state senate.[41] A similar tax failed to move forward in nearby Prince George's County, Maryland, in April 2011, and opponents cited concerns about jobs and the economy.[42] Neighboring Montgomery County, Maryland approved a five-cent tax in May 2011, but it has yet to take effect.[43]
[edit]Recycling laws
Many cities and states in the United States - including California, New York, Chicago, Delaware and Baltimore - have addressed bag litter and landfill by enacting new recycling laws.

Source: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic_shopping_bag

[thepartsmancometh]

I would not pay for them. Nowhere here would dream of charging for them. We generally use canvas, but every now and then we will get plastic on purpose (great for cat litter!)

[Altitude]

And how do they expect people to get their groceries home?

They want you to buy the reusable canvas bags.

[CrankyOldMan]

I hadn't encountered this until I went to a Walmart in S.Korea back in '04. It was something on the order of $0.25, but from that moment on, I always brought a backpack to the store. As a general rule nowadays, I don't take a bag (paper or plastic) if I can fit it in my pockets/arms.

As far as the in-store bags (they're plastic, not canvas), they do make a marginal profit off each one sold, but the real savings to them in overhead is HUGE. Just think about what is involved in ordering, shipping, distributing, storing and dispensing. For a mom & pop single franchise business, it's hard to measure the difference, but for a national/international chain, the volume is significant.

The bigger issue for me is the fact that they're a petrolium product. Even if you recycle the ones you use, just using them produces demand for a non-renewable resource. Bags aren't made from recycled bags: bags are made from new petrolium stock; recycled bags make park benches and faux lumber products. Yes, recycling them does reduce the landfill volume, but it doesn't solve the unsustainable source issue.

And as far as the USA not adopting the same policy, just look at the styrofoam packaging of fast food in the 70s/80s. The fatal flaw of captialism is that a company will never internalize a cost that it doesn't have to. Hence regulation and gov't oversight. All it takes is one bill passed in congress (state or federal) to fix the problem. Well, assuming that the lobbyists don't have their way with it first, but that's another rant alltogether.

[fnkngrv]

I find the fee atrociously stupid. It is like the airlines having the separate baggage fee. The are compartmentalizing something that they could just average into the cost of items by performing some analysis. This would be like some places that I have seen that states specifically if you use credit/debit rather than cash you will pay an additional $.35 or whatever so the business doesn't have to pay for providing the service. You don't think Wal-mart or the likes doesn't calculate that into their costs? In some ways I see why they itemize for the bags just because it is an "in your face" approach therefore it stems some abuse, but still. If they are going to itemize some then they need to just do it across the board. We actually have a grocer here locally that provides you with no form of baggage for your purchase. You have to bring something with however I wouldn't doubt it if that raises shoplifting since people have to carry around their storage capacity with them through the store. As an effect the grocers prices are significantly lower than their competition, so who really knows.

[WeeYari]

The are compartmentalizing something that they could just average into the cost of items by performing some analysis.

It's government imposed, not retailer.

[cali yaris]

I wouldn't pay for them either. That's because I remember my re-usable ones.

How about taking a little responsibility and bothering to remember things instead?

The store is a business, if they want to charge, they get to charge. Deal with it.

[Altitude]

It's government imposed, not retailer.

I'm not sure this is true, but if it is...

In fairness those plastic bags are an environmental hazard so you either deal with the government trying to get rid of them or pay taxes to have the government clean up the mess they cause.

[Kal-El]

Anyone shop at a discount grocer? Like Save-a-Lot or Price Rite (North East)?

The bags are 5 cents each but a heavy duty reusable plastic (you could load it with dumbbells and carry it without ripping). You are also responsible for your own bagging at a separate counter area. At these stores, there are very few employees and the food is set on pallets in much of the store.

The benefit? Rock bottom prices on the same brand name foods that you pay double (yes, double) for at the big name retailers with their fancy set ups.

[thebarber]

Didn't think I'd get this kind of response

replacement is my problem...I bring in the bags from the previous trip and don't restock the car

For me it's the principle as well....its not that its law to charge 5c, stores are just padding their bottom line. I do actually try to use green bags, but they get left at home from the last time I used them

Didn't mean to get your panties in a bunch, yw

[wildcard]

FWIW I work for a major retailer in the US, and our cost last year for plastic bags was somewhere to the tune of 390 million dollars.

Now this really has nothing to do with this seemingly goverment mandated canadia thing, but i was merely trying to illustrate that those "cheap" bags can add up to a significant cost overhead for a company.

[fnkngrv]

FWIW I work for a major retailer in the US, and our cost last year for plastic bags was somewhere to the tune of 390 million dollars.

Now this really has nothing to do with this seemingly goverment mandated canadia thing, but i was merely trying to illustrate that those "cheap" bags can add up to a significant cost overhead for a company.


I am not doubting that they add overhead. I am just suggesting that they are full of crap if they try and say they don't account for that in their prices. The beauty as well as problem with capitalism is that it allows for someone selling something to add an additional percentage per hop of the path for the product even if it is not warranted or called for to the point of abuse.

[fnkngrv]

Anyone shop at a discount grocer? Like Save-a-Lot or Price Rite (North East)?

The benefit? Rock bottom prices on the same brand name foods that you pay double (yes, double) for at the big name retailers with their fancy set ups.

I personally think that the correct approach is the one where a retailer makes it clear up front that they would not provide removable storage options for customers unless they are in the disabled or elderly. This would be a way to cut down on those overhead costs, stay a little greener, and still support those that would not have the ability for said removable storage.

[fnkngrv]

Didn't think I'd get this kind of response

replacement is my problem...I bring in the bags from the previous trip and don't restock the car

For me it's the principle as well....its not that its law to charge 5c, stores are just padding their bottom line. I do actually try to use green bags, but they get left at home from the last time I used them

Didn't mean to get your panties in a bunch, yw

I don't think that you got yw's panties in a bunch. You brought up a topic of discussion that it neither religious, racial, nor political.

[wildcard]

I am not doubting that they add overhead. I am just suggesting that they are full of crap if they try and say they don't account for that in their prices. The beauty as well as problem with capitalism is that it allows for someone selling something to add an additional percentage per hop of the path for the product even if it is not warranted or called for to the point of abuse.

I agree completely. Places that charge for bags, be it airlines or whoever, is gouging the customer.

Again, i don't know about this canada thing though.

[WeeYari]

From the Toronto Star - May 9, 2007

The provincial government wants Ontarians to cut in half the number of plastic shopping bags they use over the next five years.
Today, Environment Minister Laurel Broten will announce a partnership with the Recycling Council of Ontario and grocer and retail associations to come up with a system of consumer incentives to meet the target, the Toronto Star has learned.
"Each of us can help clean up our environment by doing little things like reducing the number of plastic bags we use," a provincial source said.
The program will be voluntary but if the carrot approach doesn't work, the province has the ability to drag out the stick in the form of mandatory per bag charges or outright bans.
The recycling council will work with all retail businesses – from large grocery chains to small corner stores – to provide incentives such as store points that can be redeemed for products, air miles or cash to customers who use reusable cloth or canvas bags.
Other elements of the program, to be rolled out in coming months, will include training for store clerks to double bag less often, put more items in each bag and stop bagging large or single items. It may also include more per bag fees. "We're working with industry to give families the tools they need to cut their use of bags in half by 2012," the source said.
Right now, Ontarians use 7 million plastic bags each day – that's about 4 bags per person every week.
There will be annual reports measuring the success, and if the voluntary system isn't working, the province can regulate tougher measures such as bag fees or bans.
"While we're keen to be partnering with industry, we will take further action if we're not seeing the kind of results that we want to see," the source said.
Many grocery stores – seeking to capitalize on increased consumer interest in the environment – have already started to try to make a dent in those numbers by offering cloth or canvas bags or reusable bins and providing goodies to customers who use them.
A&P and Dominion, for example, sell a 99-cent reusable shopping bag that holds the equivalent of about three plastic bags of groceries, and give 5 air miles to customers with reusable bags. With all grocers and other stores on board, through their associations, competition will set in and incentives are likely to rise.
The incentive program flows from a pilot project in Sault Ste. Marie, which is trying to find out what it takes to get people to remember to bring their reusable bags back to the store.
"What are consumers looking for? What will make them remember to open the trunk and bring the reusable bin or the reusable bag. `Gee, if I'm going to get $5 off my groceries I'll do it,' or air miles or whatever the incentive is – what is enough to (encourage) them to take it back?" Jo-Anne St. Godard, executive director of the Recycling Council of Ontario, said of the pilot project.
The council is a non-profit organization dedicated to eliminating waste.
Ontario is in the midst of a waste-disposal crisis. Municipalities and businesses send some 4 million tonnes of garbage, much of it from the GTA, to Michigan each year.
But it's not a landfill shortage that drives people to want to reduce plastic bags, St. Godard said. "The biggest issue from a public standpoint is the problem plastic bags cause with litter. People see them in their communities, they see them on the way to work, they see them at the park," she said.
Ontarians have embraced recycling through their blue and grey curbside boxes and in many municipalities, green bin organics, too. Now it's a matter of having people think of using reusable bags as an extension of their recycling efforts, St. Godard said.
"It's one of those ways we can do something about the environment and it's not that big of a decision," she said.
Ontario is one of many jurisdictions around the world trying to curb the growing number of plastic bags, which are made from petroleum products and take hundreds of years to break down.
Ireland led the way in 2002 by charging about 22 cents per grocery bag and putting the millions raised into recycling programs.
In March, San Francisco became the first city in North America to ban plastic bags in grocery stores and large pharmacies. Retailers were given six months to a year to come up with alternatives such as cloth, paper or biodegradable bags.
In April, Leaf Rapids, a small town in northern Manitoba, became the first municipality in Canada to ban plastic shopping bags.
There is some debate about whether bans and high bag fees reduce the use of plastic overall or just drive people to buy more garbage bags, made of even thicker plastic, to use for kitchen waste or to pick up after their dog. While plastic bags are often used several times before they are discarded, in the end, few of them get recycled.
Overall, Ontario residents and businesses combined recycled only 25 per cent of their trash last year. That's far behind the 2003 Liberal election promise to divert 60 per cent of waste from landfills by 2008 through the three Rs (reduce, reuse, recycle) and composting.
The environment minister now says the province will be focusing on the first R – reduce.
"Like every single Ontarian, I want to see us reduce our environmental footprint, the legacy that we're leaving as a generation of heavy consumers, and we're going to tackle that issue," Broten said in a recent interview.

[Altitude]

For me it's the principle as well....its not that its law to charge 5c, stores are just padding their bottom line.

I'm sure the charge is meant to discourage their use. The profit is just incidental.

[fnkngrv]

I'm sure the charge is meant to discourage their use. The profit is just incidental.

The incentive to discourage waste is fine however a retailer deciding to put some icing on the cake is exactly what I was discussing about capitalism and it being abused.

[TLyttle]

It has been a long time since I visited Europe, but I do remember going into a shop and buying bread. Bang. On the counter is your loaf of bread, pay up. Same thing in cheese shops. It was up to YOU to bring your own bags for the goods you were going to buy, think ahead, Colonial! Why should the retailer do it for you? Believe it or not, it isn't difficult to change your ways, just take your own bags, simple as that.

[tomato]

I don't think that you got yw's panties in a bunch. You brought up a topic of discussion that it neither religious, racial, nor political.

LOL!! :laugh::laugh:

Everything always boils down to politics somehow :wink:

I've started to bring my own bags almost everywhere but sometimes it's not possible (living in the City, you can only walk around with so much stuff on your person) and paper bags are still included at most grocery stores, thank goodness. When I was a kid (I grew up in Europe), we had something resembling an expandable fishnet and that's everybody used to go to the market or go to the grocery store. We were green before it was in style :wink:

[cali yaris]

Didn't mean to get your panties in a bunch, yw

You didn't. I don't wear any. :wink:

[Hamster]

It has been a long time since I visited Europe, but I do remember going into a shop and buying bread. Bang. On the counter is your loaf of bread, pay up. Same thing in cheese shops. It was up to YOU to bring your own bags for the goods you were going to buy, think ahead, Colonial! Why should the retailer do it for you? Believe it or not, it isn't difficult to change your ways, just take your own bags, simple as that.

I've been to Germany multiple times. In grocery stores in Germany, you always bring your own bag, always. If you forget, some stores will give you a bag, but there's a charge for it. I can't remember what the charge was, but it's a lot more than five cents. As for making you pay for other stuff, for some reason, retail stores and shopping centers in Germany charge money to use the bathroom, even if you're a paying customer. If you gotta take a whiz, it could set you back as much as fifty cents. Yes, I know water's expensive in Germany, but charging customers to use the bathroom is just plain idiotic. So, complain all you want about having to pay for bags. It could be much worse....You could be living in Europe, and have to pay to use the restroom during your shopping trip!

[wildcard]

I've been to Germany multiple times. In grocery stores in Germany, you always bring your own bag, always. If you forget, some stores will give you a bag, but there's a charge for it. I can't remember what the charge was, but it's a lot more than five cents. As for making you pay for other stuff, for some reason, retail stores and shopping centers in Germany charge money to use the bathroom, even if you're a paying customer. If you gotta take a whiz, it could set you back as much as fifty cents. Yes, I know water's expensive in Germany, but charging customers to use the bathroom is just plain idiotic. So, complain all you want about having to pay for bags. It could be much worse....You could be living in Europe, and have to pay to use the restroom during your shopping trip!

What ? Are you suggesting that we shouldn't be trying to emulate the europeans ? Thier economy is just booming and the increasingly european style tax and economic systems we have been adopting over the last 50 years or so has obviously shown such a marked improvement on our own financial security in this country.

[TLyttle]

True 'nuff about the washrooms there, but one doesn't see the outrages found in North American public washrooms. They even have full-time attendants, and best you either pay the fee or tip the attendant. Much smarter, and it keeps the silly snots from "having fun" at everyone else's expense.

[Hamster]

Yeah, but I just hated to have to pay to use the toilet while in Europe. I don't care how nice and clean the toilets are (and that's true about them having attendants), I just never understood why a store should charge its own customers to use the bathroom.

[TLyttle]

Something about "planning ahead" maybe...

[mlfoy]

i always end up forgetting my canvas bags in the car or at home and i usually have a kid (or two) with me at the store.

[thebarber]

I'm in Michigan this week....I double bagged all of our groceries at meijers yesterday and ran over a baby seal on the way back to my sister in laws

[Altitude]

^^^ I thought you were banned from the US?

[thebarber]

^^^ I thought you were banned from the US?

Why do you think that? Too much awesome?

[mazilla]

Haha, that's what you get for living in Canada...



Try charging for bags in my hood, somebody will toss a maltov cocktail at your store.

[Altitude]

Why do you think that? Too much awesome?

Too many dead baby seals.