Reusable Shopping Bags

I personally think these are a brilliant idea, and it's great that they're coming back into style. I just keep one in my backpack all the time; it means that the mass of plastic bags in the kitchen is slowly being reduced, and it creates much less waste. They're more comfortable to carry, to boot.

It interests me that some retailers are attempting to entrench good habits into their customers through incentives to use these; President's Choice, for example, will give you the equivalent of 5¢ via their points programme each time you use one of their bags. (Since they only cost a dollar, that effectively means that they pay for themselves after 20 uses.)

Has anyone else fallen in love with them? Is there anything to dislike about them? Any especially creative uses you've found for your bags?

I think that carrying a reusable shopping bag with you is a great idea. If you think of how many plastic bags we use every day and throw them away after using.
IMO the best thing to do would be carrying a cloth bag with you all every time you go shopping or keep it in your car.


Also, there is this disposable plastic which decomposes. But the problem is that it is 10x more expensive than normal plastic so if a normal plastic bag costs about 10-20 cents than we would have to pay around $ 1-2 for each bag.

I have an old NoFrill cloth bag (3 to 4 years old bag and cost $2 at that time), 2 Costco huge bags (cost $2 each) and 1 Canadian Tire free bag in my trunk all the time. The free CT bag is the best because I can fold it small enough to put in my pocket (okay, I have a big pocket). It was free last week if you buy anything from CT.

Originally Posted by Chrysogonus

It interests me that some retailers are attempting to entrench good habits into their customers through incentives to use these; President's Choice, for example, will give you the equivalent of 5¢ via their points programme each time you use one of their bags. (Since they only cost a dollar, that effectively means that they pay for themselves after 20 uses.)

Will they give you 5 cents if you don't use PC mastercard?

I have 1 big IKEA bag and a smaller one in the trunk, usually put these to good use when we go grocery shopping

Originally Posted by neglitex

If you think of how many plastic bags we use every day and throw them away after using.

Well, how about just re-using that plastic bags rather than throwing them away? Some plastic bags are quite sturdy and can be used many times.

We prefer our green bins that we bought from Zehrs probably close to 10 years ago. They fit the carts perfectly and I can always find other uses for them around the house. They make great individual laundry hampers on laundry day(s).

I've got a couple from Zehr's ($1/each) and a couple from Remark Farms (same price). They're good and sturdy, the handles never tear and they also make a good book bag.

reuseable shopping bags have been around a long time ago. I had one since 1995.

Originally Posted by canabiz

I have 1 big IKEA bag and a smaller one in the trunk, usually put these to good use when we go grocery shopping

Same here.

I've been using my "$2 blue Ikea bag" for grocery shopping since 2000.

Originally Posted by Chrysogonus

I personally think these are a brilliant idea, and it's great that they're coming back into style. I just keep one in my backpack all the time; it means that the mass of plastic bags in the kitchen is slowly being reduced, and it creates much less waste. They're more comfortable to carry, to boot.

It interests me that some retailers are attempting to entrench good habits into their customers through incentives to use these; President's Choice, for example, will give you the equivalent of 5¢ via their points programme each time you use one of their bags. (Since they only cost a dollar, that effectively means that they pay for themselves after 20 uses.)

Has anyone else fallen in love with them? Is there anything to dislike about them? Any especially creative uses you've found for your bags?

I have about 6 of the Sobey's bags. My fav. thing about them is how large and strong they are. I carry home in those 6 backs what used to take about 15 plastic ones.

On a side note I find the Walmart and PC/Loblaws bags are way too small. Sobey's are great.

The bad part is now I have an ever-dwindling supply of trash bags for the cat litter.

MEC started selling their in-store shopping bags. I picked one up and it is perfect. It has a large capacity, so it's used mostly for carrying light-things. It's heavy duty and water resistant.

I've been using the PC bins for a few years now and they are very handy, both for groceries and for toting other things around. They fit perfectly in the trunk but are cumbersome to use as a basket and carry by hand.

We started using these after we moved and had accumulated thousands of plastic bags over the years. Now we barely ever have them lying around. I use one to bring my lunch to work, but I use it for probably two weeks before I throw it out.

Its nice to have when carrying the groceries, as they hold more and you don't have to worry about the handles breaking with heavy items. As well, the cloth handles wont hurt your hands like plastics ones can.

we reuse all of our plastic bags for the dog, or for lining the green bin.. but use our PC shopping bins when we are not low on bags.

I love the PC bags, they are very sturdy and hold much more stuff than plastic. I'm always amazed when I'm shopping though, how many people are still using all plastic. It's only a one time $7 investment (in my case). To get bags for the cat litter , I just pack my meat in plastic (no leakage in my cloth bags and at most I use is 3) and the rest in my recycled ones. I find this works best for me. Just keep them in my trunk and they're handy when I shop.