(no subject)

[seekingferret]

I'm seeing notices in grocery stores that starting next week, New Jersey law will require that they not give away disposable plastic bags. Anybody have any tips on how to navigate a reusable bag world? Best bags to use? Best practices for cleaning? Best way to remember to keep bags in your car/on your bicycle for use?

I have a bunch of bags, but I don't have many that I would not be upset if pickle juice spilled all over them, so I'm definitely going to need some new bags.

Comments

[james]

I have found the best bags are the ones with handles long enough to put over my shoulder and carry when the bag is full. Canvas bags can just be chucked in the laundry, as well.

[ambyr]

I have free conference bags coming out my ears (though, okay, no new infusions since 2020 so the supply may eventually dry up), so I’ve never contemplated deliberately buying any. My advice is geared to walking with groceries, not driving or biking, but I find a mix of bag sizes is helpful: the really big bags for if cereal is on sale if I buy four 18oz boxes, the small bags for eggs and squishable bread and stuff like that.

[cahn]

We just got a couple of the reusable plastic-y ones that the local grocery stores carry, which have a familiar form factor (same as the large paper bags), and also I totally don't care if pickle juice spills on them (and they're easy to wipe down if/when that happens).

We usually just try to put them right back in the car after putting away the groceries, that's the easiest way to remember. But for those times when going outside is just a pain, we have a place for them by the door where, if we see grocery bags there, we're like "oh right, they need to be put away " the next time someone goes out the door.

[chestnut_pod]

Ditto the technique for remembering bags!

[lirazel]

That's what I do too! I put the bags directly in front of my door so that next time I go out of it, I will take them with me to put in the car.

[sophia_sol]

I have a few packable bags (made out of thin-yet-strong material that pack down into a very small area) that I just keep stored in a number of places -- one in my purse, several in my backpack, etc, and I never go out without at least one of my purse or my backpack, so I always have at least one accessible that way. The bags I have are very washable, but I don't find they need washing that much; if one happens to get dirty, I'll toss it in that week's laundry, but otherwise they keep keeping on.

It's also amazing how much you can just stick in a backpack without any kind of grocery bag at all, and that's what I usually do when I'm going out on purpose to buy things -- just make sure I have my backpack with me. And then the packable bags stored in a pocket of it are just in case I run out of room in the backpack.

I don't remember what brand I have, but I think chicobag and baggu are two companies that currently sell packable bags similar to what I have. You can get both tote bag styles and cross-body shoulder bags; I find the latter helpful when I need to carry stuff home when I'm on my bike.

[grrlpup]

I like the bags that are plasticized equivalents of a paper grocery bag, with handles. They stand up by themselves when I'm trying to fill them, and they fold flat. The surface doesn't get stained like canvas bags do. Mine were freebies from community events.

They live by the front door; the weekly dedicated grocery trip is the only time they're needed so it's been pretty easy to sequence "make list...grab bags."

[cahn]

Yes, these are the kind we have! I was trying to describe them above but you do it better. All of our local grocery stores have them for sale.

[starlady]

Been living plastic bag free for years out here and I have found that the plastic-y reusable bags from Trader Joe's are the most versatile in terms of being a) washable and durable and b) fitting the most stuff as well as c) fitting in panniers on bikes. Inculcating the habit of carrying them around took a bit of work, I try to make sure to keep two bags with my grocery list once I finish it every week. I also carry one of those soft squishable reusable bags in a sack as a backup or if I'm in a store randomly.

[calledtovienna]

I typically have a few extra bags in my motorcycle paneers and tend to be careful with objects that I put in my backpack/paneers otherwise. Since I live in a city where the weather changes sharply at 5PM, I almost always have a backpack on me, so that's less of a problem. My building actually has a building-wide shopping cart, so I typically end up using that to bring the groceries up from the garage, and then return it right after.

Are they banning them outright, or just charging $0.25 or $0.10 for them? To be honest, often my workaround for "bags that I don't care to spill pickle juice on" is to pay the extra bag fee.