SBT: Plastic No Longer Wave of Future

This morning, one of my colleagues warmly greeted me as the "Bag Lady." I've gladly accepted this moniker since hosting BagFest last year, so hearing this endearing term didn't serve my colleague's intended purpose. She asked if I had read today's SB Tribune. I hadn't; I had just finished teaching my 8:30am research-methods class when we spoke.

So I was pleasantly surprised when she told me about this story in today's SBT. Truth be told, I forgot I was interviewed for this story, which took place at least three weeks ago!

At any rate, I'm very encouraged to see Martin's promote their reusable bag program - so take note - we now get .05 cents off for each reusable bag we bring to Martin's. Woo hoo!!

(For future reference, I'll also post this article in the Media section of the blog.)

Merry Christmas!

Happy holidays! Love to you all, both near and far. Today's post comes from my friend Len, who reads my blog regularly but never comments! So he's making his debut by sharing his holiday travels (and personal journey involving bags, of course!) with us. I hope you enjoy his post! :0) M

Driving home from Louisville, KY on the 22nd of December, it occurs to me that this can be a strange and paradoxical season. It’s the winter solstice and, as if on cue, the temperatures drop and the wind blows icy cold creating a numbing chill. This uncomfortable condition is only exasperated by my somewhat twisted sense of obligation and competition that finds my home thermostat – now at 62 degrees --creeping ever lower. But, at the same time, this is a time of hope. The shortest day of the year means that the sun has turned and the days will now start to get longer. And by design, the early Christians chose this time of the year to celebrate the birth of Jesus. So,what does this all have to do with an environmental blog about plastic bags?

I guess it comes down to a question as to whether you are a “glass half full” or “half empty” kind of person. Or, perhaps more appropriately, are you a “landfill half empty” kind of person. Do the winds of December depress you or does the knowledge that we are now 1 day closer to Spring bring you some comfort? Me, well, I am a dyed-in-the-wool fence-sitting kind of guy.

Last week, I was at Martin’s and I turned down a plastic bag – again. I have not kept track of how many times I have done so, but I know it is more than the number of dates I have had in the past two years. So, that is a good thing. But, at the same time, I feel like I am jousting with windmills, unable to make even a blip of a dent in the number of bags that fly out the door of even this one store. So, to try to make my bag refusal more than an empty gesture, I always tell the checkout person WHY I refuse the bags and remind them that they are the first line of defense against this insidious plague. Usually I get a blank stare or a protest that limiting the number of bags they give out could directly correlate with the time they spend in the unemployment line. But this time, the two people behind me agree and chime in, and even the check out lady says, “You’d be amazed at how many people turn them down.” And, they next day, the bagger, a young man in his late teens, adds to my speech, “Yeah, they are bad for the environment.” So, I am feeling better about life in America. Some people actually do get it.

But then, the next night I am staying at a Holiday Inn Express in Louisville, and all I can see, everywhere I look, is plastic. The wastebaskets and ice buckets are lined with plastic bags. There are two bars of soap, each wrapped in a tiny little plastic bag. The coffee for the coffeemaker is in a plastic bag. And, the plastic cups are wrapped in little plastic bags. I am staying in a plastic hell.

But, every ying has its yang. The next day I go grocery shopping with my son and I am shocked – and elated – to learn that he has purchased 10 reusable shopping bags from Meijers! The bags cost him $1 each, but he gets 5 cents off the contents of every bag he uses. He tells me the bags are also available at Krogers. So, there is some financial incentive for him and grocery shopping suddenly became fun for me, as I proudly bagged and toted his groceries.

So, back in the “Bend” I head off to Martins once again. It is now noon on Christmas Eve and I am still on a little bit of a high from my trip to the Louisville Meijers. The parking lot is packed and I feel fortunate to have found a reasonably close parking. I walk across the lot and see a guy I know vaguely from somewhere. We both are in the Christmas spirit and we exchange a nod, a smile and a quick hello. Then I enter the store and suddenly I experience the strangest sensation. The aisles are packed and patrons are stacked 6 deep at every available checkout counter. I am sure there must have been some music playing and some decorations and Poinsettias, but all I can see – I mean ALL I can see – are plastic bags. Plastic bags bombard my visual senses. I can see NOTHING else. Dozens of full stuffed bags huddled in shopping carts, hundreds of bags pouring out the door, and thousands more lined up like piles of deadly ammunition waiting their turned to be fired off into the world. Baggers are grabbing them and filling them faster than I could ever hope to count. My second thought – right after, “damn you, Michelle!” – is the utter hopelessness of the battle we are waging.

Suddenly, I am depressed. It’s Christmas Eve, and I am depressed. I trudge off and buy three apples, carrying them in my hand rather than using the plastic bags provided. I pick up a jar of peanut butter and head for the express lane. The guy in front of me is a friend of mine. He is an attorney, and one of the most unemotional and stoic people I know. We chat briefly, then it is his turn in line. He has only one item, and he refuses the bag! I congratulate him on his decision and he says to me as he is leaving, “We all do what we can.” !

Finally, I, too, turned and left. As I passed the final checkout lane a lady was paying for her load of groceries. Like so many others, her cart was stuffed with bags. But these bags looked different. I walked over to take a closer look – they were re-usable bags from http://www.papernorplastic.com/. And once again, I was a landfill half empty kind of guy.

The number at the top of this page is off by 0.0000000001%

Yes, and that's because today, at Whole Foods this evening I refused my 500th plastic bag since having first stumbled upon this page. That's 500 fewer bags ending up in landfills. I've been counting since I received from Michelle Verges a set of canvas bags that I bring everywhere with me.

This includes small bags, the kind that they give out at gas stations when you buy a can of soda. I hate those little bags the most. What use do I have for a little plastic bag? As if I couldn't hold that 12 ounce can in my own hands?

Because of this general annoyance, the other day, I completed a little observational study and watched bag use at Philadelphia's equivalent to 7-11 (called Wa-Wa), 100 people go through the line. All were offered plastic bags. Seven refused the bag, and 93 accepted the bag. Of the 93 who accepted the bag, 20 threw away the bag at the trash can at the door of the store. So the bag was of use to these individuals for a sum total of less than five seconds.

In psychology, we often speak of the affordances of objects - fuzzy objects have a certain affordance that makes you want to pick them up - sharp objects an affordance that makes you want to handle them carefully. I wonder how much could be changed if just the affordance of the store were changed - if you simply were not offered a bag, but had to ask for one. I doubt that any of those 20 who tossed the bag at the door would have asked for one. For them, in fact, the bag seemed something of an inconvenience - something to get rid of. I admire the seven for simply refusing the bag outright. The problem is to change the 20 into people like me, who have no interest in carting around billions of bags.

But I find the social interaction and reaction of people to be somewhat startled when I refuse bags. Almost as if by refusing a plastic bag, I am violating the store schema we're all used to in which we walk out with our items neatly bagged. An awkward moment of trying to figure out what this means, that I wouldn't take a bag, or that I had my own bag with me. Just the other day, I bought a bottle of cologne, and the clerk made me put a little sticker on it saying "PAID" - as if there was some kind of guard who would have tackled me at the Asian Market and refused to believe the receipt that I had in hand.

Most disappointing in saving 500 bags, that perhaps a dozen or so times, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the clerk throw the unaccepted plastic bag into the trash behind the counter - as if simply because the bag has been pulled from the dispenser that it is in some ways polluted - as if the next person who walked in would be disgusted by a bag not visually pulled from the dispenser thingy. That seems silly, quite frankly.

Hopefully this will change in the future. With blogs like this, it may be possible. I think everyone should start counting the number of bags they refuse!