So Sainsbury’s have become the latest supermarket to remove carrier bags from their tills. This adds their name to a growing list, along with Asda and Co-Operative Food, and what a good idea! Take the bags away, and it will encourage people to use their own bags instead! Well… that, unfortunately, is not always quite the way it works out, and I’m sure I’m not the only one to have noticed this.
Just this week, I was picking up a few bits and pieces from my local Sainsbury’s and heard announced over the tannoy, “Sainsbury’s will no longer be offering plastic bags at the tills in order to encourage customers to use their own bags. Bags will be available if you need them – just ask the cashier at the till”.
“What a good idea!” I said to my partner at the time. “Sainsbury’s’ environmental policies keep getting better!”
So you can imagine the look that passed between the two of us when, standing at the till, just as announced, the bags had been removed to discourage unnecessary use. However rather than having to ask for a bag because they had none with them, the cashier plucked a wadge of carrier bags from beneath the counter and just passed them to person in front of us. Now OK, so customer service is very important to most supermarkets, I’m sure. But surely this is more than a slight failing to meet the objective of removing the bags?
You may be reading this and thinking that I’m being a bit harsh, but I don’t think I am really. Especially if you consider the next thing that happened. The people in front bagged up their food and left, so, in the normal fashion, I proceeded to the end of the till ready to bag up my purchases – I hasten to add, 3 bags for life in my hand, and not out of the eyeline of the cashier.
“Do you want any bags, love?”
I felt very much like saying, “Oh what the hell, give me 10! I’m bored of these recycled old things anyway!” The words had rolled off her tongue as easily as “cash back?”.
And it’s not just Sainsbury’s who haven’t quite got the hang of the not offering bags thing. A few of months back, the Co-op up the road from us cellotaped notices to their tills advising customers that a strict deadline was approaching. Carrier bags would no longer be available willy-nilly at the tills so customers would need to bring their own bags with them. No need to worry if an emergency happened however, as carrier bags could be made available at the cashier’s discretion.
Again, maybe the cashiers have an epidemic of compulsive customer service disorder and can’t bear to not offer a bag, but there has not been one occasion that springs to mind when we weren’t asked,
“Do you want a bag?”
Maybe it’s just me, but I would have thought that part of the line of thought when coming up with this plastic waste reduction strategy would have been based at least loosly on the findings of highly paid behavioural experts psycho-analysing Mr and Mrs Customer and coming to the conclusion that to stand there and ask for a carrier bag, and therefore declaring to all the other shoppers standing in line that they, Mr and Mrs Customer, are uncaring, environmentally unfriendly Carrier Bag Criminals.
And to have to stand there among a sea of people clasping their ‘bags for life’ and endure the scathing looks and tutting remarks uttered under eco-conscious breath, would be too much for said CBCs, resulting in them putting their ready-bleeped groceries back into their basket or trolley and ferry them to the car, or bundle them into their arms without the protective shroud they’re used to and make a precariously balanced way home, vowing to start eating into Mount Vesuvius of bags sitting at home next time. But when somebody says, “Want a bag, love?” it takes as much effort to say “yes” as “no”, and when somebody offers you something, you probably wouldn’t feel much guilt at all. You may tell yourself as you walk through the doors, “I must start bringing my bags with me.”, but to ask somebody for something is a whole different kettle of fish.
There’s always an alternative way to deal with the Carrier Bag Criminals. Most supermarkets now have a carrier bag recycling facility near to the entrance of the store. Rather than sending them off to create emissions and be be made into new carrier bags (interesting philosophy, making a bag into a bag… unless it’s ripped beyond use, I never did get my head around that one), if somebody answers “yes please” to the Carrier Bag Question, the cashier could reach beneath the counter and instead of handing over a fresh pile of plastic, hand over 3 or 4 bags from the Bag Bank! There’s the added bonus that they wouldn’t have to waste 5 minutes trying to open the damn thing either!
Other items you might find of interest:
- Britain’s Supermarkets Get Packing
- 48% Reduction In Carrier Bag Usage; 2% Short Of Target
- Banish the Bags – Morrisons Hand Out Free Bags For Life
Tags: carrier bags, supermarkets
[...] February Gordon Brown threatened supermarkets that unless they took action to reduce the amount of carrier bags given away, currently 1 billion bags every year of which many are shipped off to landfill after a [...]
I work part-time for a smaller; supposedly ethical, food store chain, while completing my dergree in environmental conservation. We no longer have bags on display but are told to ask ” would you like a bag?”. I am very reluctant to even ask the question, changing it slightly to “Do you need a bag?” I would love to add ‘really’.
Working in other countries in Europe it was strange to return to the UK and see large super markets, like Morrisons, practically throw carrier bags at customers.
Many customer see their ‘Free’ carrier bag as a right and always insist on it. It still amazers me to see cutomers with large designer type shopping bags demand that there already packaged sandwich shound be put into yet more packaging in the form of a plastic carrier bag rather than put it in there near empty shoping bag. We are very lucky to have well packaged milk in the UK, very sturdy with its own carrying handle. So why do some customer want this single small package put into futher packaging, perhaps they do not want people to know what they have bought. What I would really like to do when customers ask to have their milk in a carrier bag, is it to take the top off the milk and pour its contents directly into the carrier bag. More and more customers with only a couple of items, mainly alreay packaged, demand their carrier bag. I find it hard to beleive that carrier bag usuage is falling at the rate the government and major super market claim.
We should band or tax carrier bags like other counties; but of cause Gordon Brown was not going to make such a definate decission. The lead has to be taken by the major retailer; not just the M&S’s and Waitrose’s.
Does anyboby know what I could do or say to encourage the rediculous over use of packaging, particularly carrier bags. Then at least I know that in the mean time I am doing what I can, and when I get that position with a large multinational I can make a big difference.