People still buying bags when shopping

[Auburngal]

It's 8.5 years since the bag charges were introduced in England (Oct 4 2015) and longer for other parts of the UK. My friend's DS was born on that day and she has pointed out he was born on the same day bag charges were introduced in England and people are shocked.

Why do people still not come shopping without bags? See the same faces most days at work buying bags. "Left the bags in the car" - pack at the car then!

If people buy on average 10 bags at 30p each per week at supermarkets, shops like B&M, Poundland - that's £156 a year. People don't look at the price as a whole they think "its only 30p".

Then see people down my road using brand new carrier bags for rubbish. Bin bags are cheaper (per unit), bigger and able to tie them up properly.

Then my work is opposite a few other shops - see customers buy two items and buy a bag from us when they have room in another shop's bag they just purchased from. What's that about?

The number of times I have bought bags is in single figures. For example - buying a coat - none of the bags I had were big enough. Brought 2 bags with me and one broke - it wasn't the retailer's bag in question. So couldn't get the replacement free.

Please stop buying bags. Fold one up inside your handbag. I am ok with those who bought more than they intend and don't have room in their own bags they have brought with them.

Taking your own bags is a simple way to help with CoL.

Because there’s not many other opportunities for her to feel superior

I end up using the bags for all sorts, not just shopping

I agree it enrages me.

I think that options for recycling and binning things need to be reformed - go to any given beach for example and there are hardly any bins let alone recycling points. It doesn’t make littering OK of course but if we’re talking about solutions it’s easier (and probably cheaper) to remedy the problem than try and create a culture shift in people

I was confused too, as you said they brought bags.

By the time I noticed was too late to edit!

There was car seat fly tipped at Waitrose car park this morning someone had obviously just chucked it out of the car door. There is often bags of stuff dumped outside the clothes bank, our recycling centre isn't even that difficult to access either like some are and is just up the road from Waitrose

@Floopani - in winter I never carry a bag. My jacket has sufficient pockets for hand sanitiser, tissues, car keys, and my phone, which has my bank card tucked into the back of the holder. But it probably depends on how much you have to carry with you. If you have small kids, I totally appreciate that you need snacks, water bottles etc and that a jacket just won't cut it! We keep our shopping bags in the car boot, so seldom have to buy more, thankfully. Again, if you walked in to work, and then decided to get a few groceries on the way home, you'd need to buy a bag, or carry a handbag. It's all relative to your current lifestyle.

I have the iPhone 15 Pro Max, it's large. It fits on my jeans pocket and it fits in my leggings pockets. I don't wear coats unless its pissing down so i have my hoody pocket too if needed.

If i'm doing a food shop in my daily car, i have our bags. If we're out and about then i don't have bags, defo not carrying a handbag just to carry a "just in case" fold up bag for shopping. CoL isn't an issue so 10/20/30p here and there isn't a problem. It's just convenience really!!

A tote bag will fit in your leggings pockets. They're smaller than a phone.

Defo never going to carry a "what if" bag. i have no issues with purchasing one if needed

Why is that the case? It isn't hard to remember a bag. They're tiny.
It really annoys me when people just don't bring their own. I work in retail myself.

My 15 Pro Max doesn't fit into my pockets but I don't wear jeans, I just leave the phone at home if I'm walking though as I don't need it, I really only need it in the car

Making things wastes resources and recycling them also costs resources. It’s why it’s best not to buy/use them in the first place. I think people think recycling makes it okay.

I think people are conditioned into thinking they need new bags. My friend use to work at WHSmiths in the 90s and people would come in and INSIST they had to have a plastic bag to put their newspaper in, then at the door, would take it out and put the bag in the bin by the door and just carry the paper. If things are available people will use them.

Autocorrect always gets me on here too and you can’t go back and change anything!

I won't stop buying bags LOL. I can afford them too unsure where the col comes into it, nor do I need to add them up to approx £156 a year. There's loads of things people do that I probably wouldn't agree with if I thought hard enough but I'd never suggest they have to stop doing it because I said so.

If someone is going out knowingly/intending to do a big shop, then it’s probably preferable/makes more sense that they take bags they have in their house, I wouldn’t look down on anyone for not doing so and buying extra bags. And sometimes people leave the house in a rush and just forget.

But also…not everyone who ends up purchasing enough items that they need a bag, was intending to do so when they went out. Sometimes people shop “off-the-cuff”; i.e. they might have wondered in town without any particular plan to do any shopping, but have a browse around a few shops anyway and see some things they like/want. Rather than go back home and come into town again with bags, it’s more convenient to purchase new ones then and there.

Also, bags can help protect against the elements, and not everyone keeps up with the weather forecast. If it’s already raining (or if it starts raining when you’re in a shop) and you’re only buying, say, a book or two that normally you’d carry home in your hands…a bag then becomes necessary to try to prevent them getting too wet.

@WaitingforCheese I used to work for Woolies and had the same thing. People would say "I need the bag so you know I've paid".
Errr....no - the receipt is the proof of purchase not the bag. Plus in the 2 feet between paying me and walking out the door why would I think you haven't paid.
I remember somebody once buying a drink. Just a drink in a bottle. Insisted on a bag. Stepped the 2 feet away to the shop door, took the drink out and went to shove the bag in the bin that was actually inside the shop by the door.
I actually called out "if you don't need the bag can I have it back" 😂
(this was pre bag tax days so he hadn't paid for it)
People are odd.

Mental, isn't it? All the justifications of being wasteful. I can afford to buy a bag, I don't care, I never have bags with me, bags are too big to carry around.

I have two small drawstring bags which live in my handbag for impulse purchases, and about a dozen reusable shopping bags in the boot of the car which have been kicking around for years, probably since about the time of the introduction of charges. Since the charges came in I've probably bought a plastic bag about a dozen times, tops. Have paid for paper bags in places like McDonalds as in Scotland these are not free and nobody wants to juggle a family's drive thru order without a bag to contain it.

I agree with you op - not so much mandating whether people use them or not but it does make me laugh when apparently "everyone" is hugely struggling in the COL but people spend so much crap on slight convenience.

I can understand getting one bag if you get something unexpectedly when you're out (although I have one of those folding ones that folds to absolutely nothing so take that with me everywhere, it's much smaller than my phone) but if you're doing a big shop don't get why you wouldn't just keep bags in the car after buying them once?

What are people even doing with all the spare bags? I honestly don't think I've bought a disposable bag since the changes came in (nearly 10yrs ago in wales) and I STILL have a random cupboard full of them. If people are still regularly buying them they must have 1000s or be chucking them all in landfill.

Because I often call in to Aldi on a Friday afternoon on my way home from work. After being up since 4am the last thing I want to do is call home first to grab a couple of bags and then have to fight my way back through all the school traffic. Yes I could stuff a couple of carrier bags into my pocket before I go out to work but at that time in a morning I can just about focus enough to drive the 10 miles there. Let alone think about remembering to grab a couple of bags

OP genuinely, are you alright? I don’t even mean this in a goady, condescending fashion but this is way too small an issue to get this worked up over. It literally makes no odds to your life how many carrier bags I keep imprisoned under my sink and likewise anyone else.

Seriously it isnt hard to bring bags.

DH fumes about those ghastly stickers that are seemingly applied with gorilla glue onto aubergines and other speciality produce. They're a nightmare, wasteful, pointless and ruin the veg.

Why the heavens they aren't just content to have the item on the computer at the checkout if they are sold by the item or by weight and ditch the individual labels is anyone's guess