Publix phasing out plastic bags
 

There was a greeter at Publix yesterday informing people that Publix will be phasing out plastic bags. I was told this new policy will be implemented in the next 2-3 months.

Re-usable bags are $.99 each. I received a re-usable bag key ring as a reminder to bring re-usable bags to Publix. It is cute!

This is something that I consider to be environmental friendly and not helpful to me for shopping. This is one of the reasons I quit Sams. I like and don't mind paying for the extra mile that Publix goes to make shopping a pleasure. We find it to be much better than Kings or Wegman which we had in our previous life. I don't want to supply or pay for my own bags. Count me out. There are way too many other services available now a days to get food to the house. We LOVE PUBLIX, don't screw it up!

A side issue will be the amount of Dog Problem Threads will be increased if plastic bags are decreased.

Most of the plastic bags that come from groceries have small slits in the bottom of them. Can you imagine the look on people's faces when the poop they pick up gets all over their fingers? :1rotfl::1rotfl:

About time.
Bring your own bags, Aldi have done it for years.
No one died, but the sea and enviroment were just a little bit cleaner and safer for wildlife.
I hope Walmart follow suit, along with all other retailers!

When Connecticut phased out plastic grocery bags a lot of people were incensed. They felt they had some kind of "right" to free bags at the supermarket, and the clothing stores, and the take-out joints.

Except, most people had totally forgotten that the world did just fine before plastic grocery bags were invented. Now, we don't even need to cut trees down to make the paper bags - we can use re-useable cloth bags instead, toss them in the washing machine every month and they're good to go, bacteria-free and sturdier than paper or plastic. A single cloth bag can last a year, even if you wash it every week. They usually cost between a buck and two bucks to replace.

And for those who want a way to pick up the dog poop, well hey - you know you can BUY a whole roll of poop-bags at supermarkets and pet food stores.

For those who need to clean the litter box (and for those who use these bags to LINE their litter boxes) - you can buy a box of 1000 for under $30 on Amazon. That should last you a year or two.

It's not a big deal. It is one of those "changes" people oppose for no reason other than they don't want change. It's especially unforgiveable if you have a problem with the plastic bags and you don't even try to re-use them. If you're just throwing them away when you get your groceries home, then you can throw away your cloth bags instead. Or not use bags. Use boxes like the big box stores and Aldi's provide.

Or - you can just pay for the container of choice. You have to pay for everything else in life, why make a fuss about a plastic bag you're just going to throw away in 10 minutes anyway?

Dam, no plastic bags up north for the dog poop but until now they were available in the Villages. I guess now we will have to pay for dog poop bags.

Have been using reusable bags for years including insulated for the cold stuff. Actually easier. Giant in PA had reusable bags plus you could ring up each item in your cart and put it directly into the bag. Sams has scan and go which speeds up the process. I know they can't do that in the grocery stores here, too many would try to steal. Closest is self check out which we use where ever available.

Paper bags please. Loved them for many purposes.
I remember shopping in Europe and they offered no bags at all, so I only bought what fit in my hand.

At least paper bags rot away in the landfills .
Europe is way ahead of USA with the removal of plastic from the enviroment, but they still have a long way to go.
We bring our shopping bags from UK with us to save using the plastic bags here.
May not be much on the scale of the problem, but at least we are making our small contribution and effort.

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."
Mao Tze Tung.

I should add: I'm a cat owner. I'll be buying bags from Amazon once they phase out the plastics. I don't like that at all, because I am one of those people who RE-USE the bags. They are never single-use bags for me. But I used to buy liners for the cat box before they invented clumping litter and that was a much greater expense, and huge waste of plastic.

In Florida, residential recycling does not allow grocery store bags. I found this out when I Googled if grocery bags are accepted as recycles in Florida after my brother-in-law told me plastic bags are not accepted in residential neighborhoods. I have always dropped off my plastic grocery bags in the bins in front of Publix or the bins at Winn Dixie. I thought those grocery bags were being recycled. Does anyone know what the grocery stores do with those plastic bags?

Tell me if I’m incorrect, but I seem to recall the outcry years ago when paper bags were the norm. Then people started an outcry about all the trees being chopped down for these bags. Isn’t that when plastic bags were introduced?

I don’t mind bring in reusable bags. I just have to remember to bring them! And then, how many do I bring? If I’m shopping for a lot of things, I suppose eventually I’ll be able to gauge how many I’ll need to bring. Learning curve, don’t ya know.

It's wonderful Publix will be phasing out plastic bags. It can only help the environment. Maybe it will only help a little but every little bit helps.

HOWEVER! With all the money they save on the bags will they reflect that in their pricing or donate it to environmental causes??? 100% NOT. So I question their altruism but support their decision.

I'd give up my left pinky finger to get Wegman's down here! :D :D

Nucky, one of the things we first noticed about using non-disposable grocery shopping bags was how much easier they are on the hands to carry out of the car into the house. And we store them in the trunk of the cars, so no storage issues in the house.

Give it a try! The hardest part was remembering to bring them out of the car into the store.

I don't have a Dog, Cat, Bird, or GoldFish No Mo.

We waited for our last dog to get into position and put the Publix Plastic Bag minus any slit, slots or holes under his butt. People would occasionally skid to a stop and ask us how we trained him to do his thing in the bag. We always told them it was rough training him but somehow with time we managed. We had a whole lotta laughs about it but I don't care to much about these little things anymore. We gave up bringing in 12 cases of Aquafina a month after we saw a documentary about Plastic in the oceans and landfills on Netflix. I did my part for a while.

If things change at Publix we'll reassess the situation and adjust to something else. Besides how many things have we read on here over the years that are speculation anywho?

We've got freezer bags for the frozen stuff we pick up at The Walmart Neighborhood Market when we order online. It's gotta be 8 to 10 miles from our house but prefer going there because it's a beautiful ride and the situation there feels a little better.

Can you imagine doing your shopping online and having to bring your own bag, container, etc and bag every item in the middle of a parking lot? I'm sorta thinking if Publix does it then Walmart and Winn Dixie will follow. Maybe yes maybe no. I get it CFrance but I don't like it at all. Thank you for being kind. :coolsmiley:

How much are we going to get paid for checking ourselves out at various stores. That was first, bags next, then who knows what else they have in line to take away from us or make us do?

Nah, it really isn't that bad. Also - if they're doing it the same way they did it in Connecticut, they will still have produce bags and bags for the meat department and fish department.

So if you have frozen stuff, if it's not too big a package, you can just put those things in the produce bags to keep them from getting everything wet while they're in the car.

Actually - they donate 10 cents for each of the 3 standard reusable bags to sustainability projects in the community (such as planting trees). They contribute up to $125,000 every year through proceeds of these sales.

According to their website, they've donated $355,000 since 2016, to the Arbor Day Foundation, that plants longleaf seedlings in a couple of watershed areas.

They've also been doing this reuseable bag program for 20 years, so the notion of them promoting them and not using single-use bags is nothing new for Publix.

You can read about the bags, and the donations, here:

Reusable Bags | Publix Sustainability

and here:

Publix Reusable Bags: An Inside Look | Publix Super Market | The Publix Checkout

Lastly - considering that this second article is dated January 8, it might be that the greeter misinterpreted it and concluded erroneously that Publix was planning on doing away with single-use bags completely.

I see no news articles, and nothing on Publix website, indicating any official change in their current policy - which is to encourage and heavily promote the use and purchase of re-usable bags.

Imagine doing this extra task in the parking lot of wherever you choose to pick up your grocery order and it's a storming or its about 350 degrees and your fighting for your next breath and you have to bag every item. Nope not for me. Takes all the convenience outta picking up your groceries. I don't want any extra step added to any process. It's perfect the way it is now. Leave it alone.

It's all hearsay at this point anyway but for the TOTV'S team I'll check it out with the store manager at Publix and report back tomorrow. I'll even get his or her name. :popcorn:

I don't like it, but I could probably live with it. However, I will switch to Winn Dixie as long as they provide free plastic bags.

Also how are they going to deliver the food to the house? Paper bags were made of recycled paper, they didn’t need to be fancy. The thing is I tend to shop when I feel like it or see something. I don’t even carry a purse.

I have and always asked for paper wherever they offer paper bags.

Wegman's / plastic bags
 

Yes, we also loved Wegman's. We're from Bucks County, Pa. There was a Wegman's in Warrington.
As for the plastic bags, I'm happy to see the restrictions on them. One of my pet peeves is that so many times the person bagging would put one or two items in a plastic bag. Such a waste!
I've been bringing my own bags with me for many years now.

I use the plastic bags the newspaper comes in for poop pickup.

I remember paper bags being phased out when I was young because cockroaches and mice nest in them.

Who gives a crap?:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

Amazon needs to stop shipping in boxes stuffed with plastic bubble wrap. They are cutting trees down and destroying the sea and environment.

In Kenya the ban came in on 28 August 2017, threatening up to four years’ imprisonment or fines of $40,000 for anyone producing, selling – or even just carrying – a plastic bag.

Yes, but the tree huggers will want to get rid of those as well. Enjoy your soggy paper!

So now we aspire to be like Kenya???:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

I was up north in December and not one store had a plastic bag. I walked out of Kohl's carrying my goods in my hands, I was actually laughing because we all looked so funny, no bag even offered. In the Shop Rite I brought the groceries to the car just like at Sam's. No big deal, just keep your cloth bags in your car or cart. People up north are all used to it. We will get that way too.

As a single, spur of the moment, grocer shopper, this doesn't work for me, not to mention ongoing attack on trees. I will focus on Winn-Dixie and Fresh Market going forward.

How's this for a protest idea:

Load up you cart, let them ring it up, and then ask what they are going to put the groceries into. If they say nothing, just walk away. If enough people do this, they'll change their tune, since it will be more expensive to them than using plastic bags.

Oh, BTW, In case my previous posts give you the wrong idea about my attitude, I'm all for recycling, saving the environment, etc. I just object to someone else mandating it and shoving it down my throat. George Orwell is mumbling in his grave "I told you so"

I don't have a dog, but when I walked my "granddogs" I would use the plastic bags that our newspapers were delivered in. Perfect size.

Well they could just cancel the buy online pickup in store program, which is new, and make you go shopping like you probably had to as recently as a year ago.

Personally I find the concept of ordering food online to be creepy anyway. I won't ever do it. I imagine I'd get home and discover the tomatoes and pears aren't ripe enough and have to bring them back. The ice cream is halfway melted, the meat has way too much fat, they got the wrong type of paper towels (I wanted the choose-your-size not the full size!), and they're missing the pound of butter. Even if just ONE thing isn't perfect, I'd have to make a whole separate trip back to the store to correct it.

So much easier to just go to the store and do it myself. And bring my bags with me.

Easy fix; keep a bag in your car.

If this Publix policy is even true, they're not mandating it for you. You are absolutely welcome to buy virgin-plastic heavy-duty garbage bags that have come straight from the oil wells, using coal or deisel fuel to fire up the machines that make it, in a town where the air pollution is so bad you can see the huge gash in the ozone layer without a telescope, and then toss them in your triple-layered extra-heavy garbage bag in your garage the second you get the groceries out of them.

However, you have to bring the bags yourself. That is all. No one is saying you can't use plastic bags. They're saying you may, but Publix is not going to pay for them. That is all.

You can always use paper bags.