February 13, 2009
Indiaretailing.com: The Drastic Plastic
By Akansha Srivastava
Through a special arrangement, what follows is an excerpt
of an article from Indiaretailing.com, presented here for discussion.
They can be seen everywhere. Rolled and stuffed into a shelf at a grocery
store, while carrying the newly bought clothes from a branded showroom; covering
the dustbins, clogging roadside drains and cluttering the landfills. They
flap from trees. They float on breeze. You got it right. It’s polybags. As
plastic bags are pretty cheap to produce, sturdy, easy to carry and store,
they have captured at least 80 percent of the grocery and convenience store
packaging market since they were introduced a quarter century ago.
The Supreme Court in India has prompted the government to ban the usage
of polybags by shopkeepers, wholesalers and retailers and asked consumers
to use cloth and paper bags. While some retailers are implementing this directive,
still many shops in the cities where the ban has been imposed could be seen
giving polybags to shoppers instead of jute or paper bags.
In order to protect the environment there are some urgent choices that need
to be made – either formulate plastic that is easily biodegradable, encourage
recycling or switch to shopping bags made of jute, cotton, recycled-paper
or other compostable material.
Biodegradable plastics are plastics that will decompose in the natural environment.
Although these plastic bags are biodegradable, it is not as simple as throwing
them in a dustbin along with other household waste. Moreover, it takes significant
natural resources to grow and process the corn to create this biodegradable
plastic.
Overall, reducing indiscriminate consumption and adopting the habit of re-using
plastic bags – in effect replacing our addiction to ‘disposables’ – is the
smartest thing we can all do right now as our contribution towards environment
protection.
"Plastic bags are so inexpensive that in the stores no one treats them
as worth anything; they use two, three or four when one would do just as
well,"
said AG Bhatia, owner, AG departmental store in India.
Discussion Questions: Are you seeing a growing backlash from U.S. consumers
over the use of non-biodegradable plastic bags? Are reusable cloth bags
the answer? Should retailers be more active in addressing the situation?
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I agree with many of the commentators above–plastic bags must ultimately go bye-bye. We’ve been hearing about recyclable plastic bags for years, as well as biodegradable bags, but these things really aren’t happening. It’s not just the landfills that they clog either, but the streams, rivers, and oceans.
If retailers and consumers won’t voluntarily get rid of these bags, government is going to have to do it for them.
While we’re on this subject, how about getting rid of packaging “popcorn” that shipping centers use? Most of it is still not biodegradable and it blows everywhere and is eaten by wildlife mistaking it for food.
The Plastic bags must go away. Our descendants 2000 years from now will be able to dig up our ancient land fills and find the logos for Publix and Kroger and everyone else as well.
Paper bags are an excellent alternative but the best alternative is the use and re-use of cloth bags, now available everywhere.
One does not need to buy a bag with a specific store logo. There are bags available which tout the importance of conserving the environment and have no store affiliation. I have also seen plain bags as well–I, for one, proudly take my cloth Publix bags everywhere and I am unconcerned about being in a competitor store [with it].
Colorado is somewhere on the California end of the “green” spectrum, though not nearly to the degree that California is. However, there is talk here of banning or charging for plastic bags at retail. Which means this is something that is coming. One year? Five years? I don’t know, but it will come.
So I don’t understand why retailers aren’t scrambling to hand out their logo’d reusable bags to their best customers as part of a loyalty program–this should be a race to get your logo on the bags that people will be using for a lot more of their shopping in the future. It’s cheap, it promotes good will with your best customers (it’s green after all!), and it brands your shoppers no matter where they shop.
But looking ahead, the whole concept is sustainability, right? Somebody being accountable for the fact that many of these bags end up in a landfill and there is a cost to that. So when do we move from plastic bags to anything you might dispose of in the trash? A packaging fee (dare I say tax?) for manufacturers based on how much of their packaging is recyclable vs. must go into the trash can? A toxic material fee for hazardous materials like lead and arsenic that are found in electronics that might end up in a landfill?
The bag thing is going to happen, and retailers would do well to embrace it and find an advantage there rather than fight it. I think the more important issue is the trend. Retailers and manufacturers need to keep an eye on how this might translate to products–a far more potent issue than bags.
Here in Canada, plastic bags are soon going the way of the dinosaur. Many municipalities have banned them or are in the process of doing so. Grocery retailers here are selling reusable cloth bags by the thousands. In many stores, you see the majority of customers dragging in their own cloth bags, or reusable plastic ‘tubs’.
It’s gotten to the point where my wife bought small mesh bags at the store to put the produce in as well.
Any retailer/manufacturer with any degree of foresight will get on with reducing packaging of any type. Consumers will demand it in ever increasing numbers. And, it’s the right thing to do (which should be good enough reason for anyone).
Plastic is cheap, durable (“greatest strength = greatest weakness”) and imminently recyclable. So the smart thing to do would be to use the heck out of them and recycle them 100% into park benches. But that requires human beings to consciously choose the smart thing over the expedient thing–not likely–although our current economy might remedy some of that if it continues on trend.
The opposite and largely emotionally-driven response is to recoil in disgust and do the opposite as a social statement. That seems to be the favored approach so far, even in the Midwest misery city of Chicago. Jewel and Dominick’s both have logo cloth bags to rival Whole Foods. Paper is offered along with the plastic, even at the self-scan lanes. “Just say no” applies to plastic bags as well, now.
Many retailers are addressing the issue in the US and Canada. Hannaford just announced it was giving away 20,000 reusable bags. Municipalities are banning [polybags] to some degree or requiring retailers to charge for them. Costco had it right from the beginning, offering corrugated shippers as the carry out option, or more recently, reusable bags for sale as well.
Consumers are more conscious of the end-of-life issues with plastic bags, Some municipalities charge for waste disposal based on volume–by bags or bin container–raising the profile for unnecessary plastic bags.
For shoppers, some of the baggers at checkout counters and self-serve systems seem to have difficulty with reusable bags, slowing down the line. But in areas where legislation and costs favor reusable bags, it’s logical that these issues will be resolved.
Even here in California, I see no real consumer wave toward reusable bags. Sure, the retailers have them at the checkouts for sale for a buck, but truly fewer than 1% of consumers use them at this point. That number is higher at Whole Foods and the like, because of the audience they serve. I agree, it is a ripe opportunity to get your logo out there. I think most reusable bags are just a bit too small to be practical for any average size family, and the design needs to be tweaked for the trip home in the car. If a retailer would take the plunge and offer a free bag with every ten-dollar purchase, consumers would soon build up a practical inventory and be more apt to get in the habit of throwing the empty bags in their cart when they start their shopping…just maybe.
One of the significant advantages the economically developing countries of the world have is the ability to compress the time frame of development experienced by the leading industrial countries. In the U.S. the Industrial Revolution is about 160 years old. In the UK and Germany, it is about 30 to 40 years older than that. In China, it is about 50 years old. In India, even less.
The countries that are serious about developing their countries economically look at all aspects of development in the same way. They measure problems that have already developed in the industrialized states and try to avoid them.
China is viewed as the coming environmental bad guy. Yes, they will produce more environmental problems as they grow. But, they also recognize how to minimize those problems. For example, their legislated automotive MPG is less than the U.S.
India retailing is booming. India recognizes that the impact of producing these plastic bags on the environment will also boom. The theory is, stop it now before momentum makes it difficult to stop. From an economic point of view, these bags add very little value to the economy. And resources may be more productive in other areas.
Europe led the way in the development and use of plastic grocery sacks. In the 70s, in Europe, plastic grocery sacks had a 90%+ share, while the U.S. was still in kraft. If we look at Europe today, we will find a dramatic drop in the use of these sacks, being replaced by reusable bags.
In the U.S. some retailers are already making the move. Food Emporium in NYC gives the shopper a five-cent credit for using their own bags and sells reusable for 99-cents. D’Agostino’s has a one bag policy. Additionally, the city is contemplating a five-cent tax on the use of plastic grocery sacks.
If retailers are not thinking about what a future operation without plastic grocery sacks will look like, both operationally and economically, they will ultimately be at a competitive disadvantage.
The growing backlash seems to come more from municipal, state and federal bureaucracies who are looking to hang their hats–and their chances for re-election–on a relatively benign issue.
People care, but not as much as you might think–especially at a time when so many people are struggling to pay the bills, including grocery. Reusable bags may elicit yet another backlash. They are only reusable temporarily, then you have to go out and buy some more. Who is selling them and making money on them? The very people who are telling you it’s better for the environment. Somebody’s going to see this as a tad disingenuous and supermarkets will have to battle another negative perception.
You’re not going to eliminate polybags. They are too cheap and too practical. However, you might want to teach your checkers how to bag. I did my grocery shopping yesterday at a local market and the last three items–a loaf of broad, a package of cheese and a bottle of soda each went into separate bags.
Physician, heal thyself!
I agree with Len Lewis here, but I also agree that there will continue to be a long-term trend toward “sustainability” and environmentally-friendly policies. Clearly, societal attitudes have moved tremendously since the 1940s that I remember, when throwing trash out the car window was a widely seen and tolerated social behavior. (OK, maybe you didn’t come from the same side of the tracks as I did. But some of you DID! :>))
The long-term trend of “environmentalism” is socially positive but the movement is easily hijacked by parties without a lick of common sense and rabid anti-business, hate humans, social consciousness. This accounts for the stumbling forward, massive economic waste of the progress made to date.
I’m something of a passive, compliant observer on this issue, but my wife is quite meticulous in adhering to “best” environmental practices.
It’s heresy time: Reusable cloth bags purchased in grocery stores should not carry their logo. Shoppers are reluctant to use the bags in competing supermarket chains, thus facing the daunting task of collecting “sets” of bags and managing them. Rather, the bags should be plain or, at the very least, carry a “Save The Whales” or other environmental message. The more different kinds of messages, the better. Collect them all! Or, imprint them with manufacturer logos (not private labels) to offset some of their cost. Wouldn’t it be interesting to see which branded bags were chosen most by shoppers? As another alternative, highly-compressible mesh bags have been shopping fixtures for centuries in other countries, but apparently have been passed over for sale in U.S. supermarkets because of their inability to carry a logo. Bypassing the logo imperative might also increase the sales and usage of this type of bag.
Oh, and Ralph Jacobson had a great point about the prevailing design of the cloth bags sold in grocery stores. They desperately require better architecture. Perhaps a stiff, internal fiberboard base and some sort of plastic ribbing to speed bagging?
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I agree with many of the commentators above–plastic bags must ultimately go bye-bye. We’ve been hearing about recyclable plastic bags for years, as well as biodegradable bags, but these things really aren’t happening. It’s not just the landfills that they clog either, but the streams, rivers, and oceans.
If retailers and consumers won’t voluntarily get rid of these bags, government is going to have to do it for them.
While we’re on this subject, how about getting rid of packaging “popcorn” that shipping centers use? Most of it is still not biodegradable and it blows everywhere and is eaten by wildlife mistaking it for food.
The Plastic bags must go away. Our descendants 2000 years from now will be able to dig up our ancient land fills and find the logos for Publix and Kroger and everyone else as well.
Paper bags are an excellent alternative but the best alternative is the use and re-use of cloth bags, now available everywhere.
One does not need to buy a bag with a specific store logo. There are bags available which tout the importance of conserving the environment and have no store affiliation. I have also seen plain bags as well–I, for one, proudly take my cloth Publix bags everywhere and I am unconcerned about being in a competitor store [with it].
Colorado is somewhere on the California end of the “green” spectrum, though not nearly to the degree that California is. However, there is talk here of banning or charging for plastic bags at retail. Which means this is something that is coming. One year? Five years? I don’t know, but it will come.
So I don’t understand why retailers aren’t scrambling to hand out their logo’d reusable bags to their best customers as part of a loyalty program–this should be a race to get your logo on the bags that people will be using for a lot more of their shopping in the future. It’s cheap, it promotes good will with your best customers (it’s green after all!), and it brands your shoppers no matter where they shop.
But looking ahead, the whole concept is sustainability, right? Somebody being accountable for the fact that many of these bags end up in a landfill and there is a cost to that. So when do we move from plastic bags to anything you might dispose of in the trash? A packaging fee (dare I say tax?) for manufacturers based on how much of their packaging is recyclable vs. must go into the trash can? A toxic material fee for hazardous materials like lead and arsenic that are found in electronics that might end up in a landfill?
The bag thing is going to happen, and retailers would do well to embrace it and find an advantage there rather than fight it. I think the more important issue is the trend. Retailers and manufacturers need to keep an eye on how this might translate to products–a far more potent issue than bags.
Here in Canada, plastic bags are soon going the way of the dinosaur. Many municipalities have banned them or are in the process of doing so. Grocery retailers here are selling reusable cloth bags by the thousands. In many stores, you see the majority of customers dragging in their own cloth bags, or reusable plastic ‘tubs’.
It’s gotten to the point where my wife bought small mesh bags at the store to put the produce in as well.
Any retailer/manufacturer with any degree of foresight will get on with reducing packaging of any type. Consumers will demand it in ever increasing numbers. And, it’s the right thing to do (which should be good enough reason for anyone).
Plastic is cheap, durable (“greatest strength = greatest weakness”) and imminently recyclable. So the smart thing to do would be to use the heck out of them and recycle them 100% into park benches. But that requires human beings to consciously choose the smart thing over the expedient thing–not likely–although our current economy might remedy some of that if it continues on trend.
The opposite and largely emotionally-driven response is to recoil in disgust and do the opposite as a social statement. That seems to be the favored approach so far, even in the Midwest misery city of Chicago. Jewel and Dominick’s both have logo cloth bags to rival Whole Foods. Paper is offered along with the plastic, even at the self-scan lanes. “Just say no” applies to plastic bags as well, now.
Many retailers are addressing the issue in the US and Canada. Hannaford just announced it was giving away 20,000 reusable bags. Municipalities are banning [polybags] to some degree or requiring retailers to charge for them. Costco had it right from the beginning, offering corrugated shippers as the carry out option, or more recently, reusable bags for sale as well.
Consumers are more conscious of the end-of-life issues with plastic bags, Some municipalities charge for waste disposal based on volume–by bags or bin container–raising the profile for unnecessary plastic bags.
For shoppers, some of the baggers at checkout counters and self-serve systems seem to have difficulty with reusable bags, slowing down the line. But in areas where legislation and costs favor reusable bags, it’s logical that these issues will be resolved.
Even here in California, I see no real consumer wave toward reusable bags. Sure, the retailers have them at the checkouts for sale for a buck, but truly fewer than 1% of consumers use them at this point. That number is higher at Whole Foods and the like, because of the audience they serve. I agree, it is a ripe opportunity to get your logo out there. I think most reusable bags are just a bit too small to be practical for any average size family, and the design needs to be tweaked for the trip home in the car. If a retailer would take the plunge and offer a free bag with every ten-dollar purchase, consumers would soon build up a practical inventory and be more apt to get in the habit of throwing the empty bags in their cart when they start their shopping…just maybe.
One of the significant advantages the economically developing countries of the world have is the ability to compress the time frame of development experienced by the leading industrial countries. In the U.S. the Industrial Revolution is about 160 years old. In the UK and Germany, it is about 30 to 40 years older than that. In China, it is about 50 years old. In India, even less.
The countries that are serious about developing their countries economically look at all aspects of development in the same way. They measure problems that have already developed in the industrialized states and try to avoid them.
China is viewed as the coming environmental bad guy. Yes, they will produce more environmental problems as they grow. But, they also recognize how to minimize those problems. For example, their legislated automotive MPG is less than the U.S.
India retailing is booming. India recognizes that the impact of producing these plastic bags on the environment will also boom. The theory is, stop it now before momentum makes it difficult to stop. From an economic point of view, these bags add very little value to the economy. And resources may be more productive in other areas.
Europe led the way in the development and use of plastic grocery sacks. In the 70s, in Europe, plastic grocery sacks had a 90%+ share, while the U.S. was still in kraft. If we look at Europe today, we will find a dramatic drop in the use of these sacks, being replaced by reusable bags.
In the U.S. some retailers are already making the move. Food Emporium in NYC gives the shopper a five-cent credit for using their own bags and sells reusable for 99-cents. D’Agostino’s has a one bag policy. Additionally, the city is contemplating a five-cent tax on the use of plastic grocery sacks.
If retailers are not thinking about what a future operation without plastic grocery sacks will look like, both operationally and economically, they will ultimately be at a competitive disadvantage.
The growing backlash seems to come more from municipal, state and federal bureaucracies who are looking to hang their hats–and their chances for re-election–on a relatively benign issue.
People care, but not as much as you might think–especially at a time when so many people are struggling to pay the bills, including grocery. Reusable bags may elicit yet another backlash. They are only reusable temporarily, then you have to go out and buy some more. Who is selling them and making money on them? The very people who are telling you it’s better for the environment. Somebody’s going to see this as a tad disingenuous and supermarkets will have to battle another negative perception.
You’re not going to eliminate polybags. They are too cheap and too practical. However, you might want to teach your checkers how to bag. I did my grocery shopping yesterday at a local market and the last three items–a loaf of broad, a package of cheese and a bottle of soda each went into separate bags.
Physician, heal thyself!
I agree with Len Lewis here, but I also agree that there will continue to be a long-term trend toward “sustainability” and environmentally-friendly policies. Clearly, societal attitudes have moved tremendously since the 1940s that I remember, when throwing trash out the car window was a widely seen and tolerated social behavior. (OK, maybe you didn’t come from the same side of the tracks as I did. But some of you DID! :>))
The long-term trend of “environmentalism” is socially positive but the movement is easily hijacked by parties without a lick of common sense and rabid anti-business, hate humans, social consciousness. This accounts for the stumbling forward, massive economic waste of the progress made to date.
I’m something of a passive, compliant observer on this issue, but my wife is quite meticulous in adhering to “best” environmental practices.
It’s heresy time: Reusable cloth bags purchased in grocery stores should not carry their logo. Shoppers are reluctant to use the bags in competing supermarket chains, thus facing the daunting task of collecting “sets” of bags and managing them. Rather, the bags should be plain or, at the very least, carry a “Save The Whales” or other environmental message. The more different kinds of messages, the better. Collect them all! Or, imprint them with manufacturer logos (not private labels) to offset some of their cost. Wouldn’t it be interesting to see which branded bags were chosen most by shoppers? As another alternative, highly-compressible mesh bags have been shopping fixtures for centuries in other countries, but apparently have been passed over for sale in U.S. supermarkets because of their inability to carry a logo. Bypassing the logo imperative might also increase the sales and usage of this type of bag.
Oh, and Ralph Jacobson had a great point about the prevailing design of the cloth bags sold in grocery stores. They desperately require better architecture. Perhaps a stiff, internal fiberboard base and some sort of plastic ribbing to speed bagging?