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  • The bag ban gets real now.

    We just got word that effective April 30, we will no longer be providing paper bags at the registers. I thought that this was another stupid town directive, but no; it's company-wide "in an effort to reduce waste".

    Customers need to either buy a reusable bag (for which the price has gone up, and will probably be increased again because they can) or bring their own. The backlash is already starting, and there is a certain subset of customers who grab as many paper bags as they can just because they can.

    I don't know how--or if--this affects my department. I'd been lobbying for at least a year to let customers use their own bags (they could state on the invoice that they have bags; we would either not bag the order or transfer it carside both of which I have done). Some stores charge for using reusable bags for orders, but it's $2 per bag (I can't tell if it's also per order). There's been negative customer feedback about that repeated charge. They haven't figured out how to let customers bring the reusable bags back to reuse If my department is somehow allowed to keep using paper (which I somehow doubt) someone is going to need to police things to keep walk-in SCs from taking all my bags.
    "I am quite confident that I do exist."
    "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

  • #2
    Charing people for using usable bags? That is insane.
    Customers should always be served . . . to the nearest great white.

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    • #3
      "Using your bag, which costs us nothing... yeah, we're gonna charge you for that" That's great advertisement for any rival stores in the area.

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      • #4
        I'm guessing that Corporate never actually considered my department in all this at all...I emailed our DM the day we were told of this and have yet to get a reply.

        ETA: Some store pickup departments get paper-thin clothlike bags which, depending on what gets put in them, suck. Those bags are slapped with the $2 fee and can't be returned/reused (so a customer is paying for 'reusable' bags with every order...they can only reuse said bags if they shop in-store), and some stores that charge for paper checkout bags are adding that fee to customer orders as well even when consolidating bags. So say an order has four cold produce items and four cold dairy items which have two printed labels each (four separate labels) but could easily fit in one Cold bag. A store may charge for four paper bags; if they only end up using one, the rest is profit.
        Last edited by Dreamstalker; 04-18-2023, 01:29 AM.
        "I am quite confident that I do exist."
        "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

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        • #5
          Quoth Kristev View Post
          Charing people for using usable bags? That is insane.
          Seconded. Two bucks to BUY a basic reusable bag? Sure! Two bucks for the privilege of using one? Fuck that. Sorry y'all have to be the ones to face the fallout of that stupidity.
          "For a musician, the SNES sound engine is like using Crayola Crayons. Nobuo Uematsu used Crayola Crayons to paint the Sistine Chapel." - Jeremy Jahns (re: "Dancing Mad")
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          "Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pronounce judgment!" ~ Carl Jung
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          • #6
            Want to charge me for using my own bags? I will just put everything back in the cart, roll it out to my car and bag them there.
            "I don't have to be petty. The Universe does that for me."

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            • #7
              Update of sorts: We're not getting rid of paper bags completely, but we will charge for them (10 cents per bag), People grab fistfuls of bags already, I can only imagine what's gonna happen in a week or so. I've started notifying my customers and I don't plan to charge them if I can get away with it.
              "I am quite confident that I do exist."
              "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

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              • #8
                Back when I worked at The Night Place, we used to knock a nickel off the cost of groceries when a customer brought in a reusable bag.
                Osoroshii kangae nimo osoware masu...

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                • #9
                  I was wondering how this would play out. The only option I could think of was using something like milk crates, which could be returned and reused - I guess a customer could have the empty ones in the trunk to return? Maybe have a deposit on them so as long as the customers keep returning them there's no charge?

                  [Sigh] The idea of ordering online for pickup seems like a good one, but charges that high will discourage some. Maybe not all. I know someone so freaked out by Covid she's only been in a grocery store a handful of times since 2022, and not at all two years before that.

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                  • #10
                    Yes...milk crates, or the plastic wing-lid totes we have too many of. Those may be too big, but we sure have enough of them. That's actually a neat idea, I'll see if I can pass that up the chain.

                    Quoth Iris Kojiro View Post
                    Back when I worked at The Night Place, we used to knock a nickel off the cost of groceries when a customer brought in a reusable bag.
                    We did that too (about 15 years ago) and I daresay it did result in people bringing their bags. Not sure why we got rid of it...needs to be brought back. Pickup customers are getting mad about not being able to reuse the reusable bags (on top of that the pickup fee--which is pure profit for the company and we don't see a penny of it--went up approximately 25%).

                    I was able to suss out a bit more clarification on the pickup reusable-bag front; apparently the stores that have the cloth-type reusable bags charge $2 per week for however many of those bags a customer uses. They have no way for a customer to reuse them easily though (now how the hell does that make sense, provide reusable bags and don't actually allow customers to reuse them unless they come into the store). What I've been doing--transferring orders to a customer's bags in their car--probably isn't scalable and it would require not only one dedicated 'runner' for each order in a slot but also for stores to keep track of customers who have bags.
                    "I am quite confident that I do exist."
                    "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

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                    • #11
                      That fee on the reusabags is still nonsense, unless a customer shops less than weekly. A subscription bag? Pah!

                      My store of choice has everything in crates and it gets transferred to whatever is provided when the customer collects (some choose to simply load it into boxes in their trunks, others have bags in there or even bags to carry hoe on foot), or at the door for deliveries (they used to be able to come in and help unload the stuff right on your counter, but the 'vid has put paid to entering places now most of the time.) I have my little pile of bags that are wearing away and need replacing but they're a minimum of 5 years old, so that's not so bad.
                      This was one of those times where my mouth says "have a nice day" but my brain says "go step on a Lego". - RegisterAce
                      I can't make something magically appear to fulfill all your hopes and dreams. Believe me, if I could I'd be the first person I'd help. - Trixie

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                      • #12
                        Other stores have the heavy-duty 5mil plastic reusable bags, but my town is Speshul(tm) and won't allow stores to provide plastic bags at all (the kicker is back when the ban was originally put in place the store could have got an exemption but chose not to; I think we're the only store in the district that requires only paper). I'm going to need those heavy plastic ones for things like frozen turkeys or raw chickens. I emailed DM about this and will see what he says; since the store as a whole won't have them it shouldn't be a huge issue (I know I will have to keep those bags under lock and key if I get them).
                        "I am quite confident that I do exist."
                        "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

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                        • #13
                          Wow. Charging people to use their own reusable bags?? My company is a typical corporate leech and even they haven't gone that far. Our reusable bags -- the ones that are roughly the size of the old plastic bags -- are 35 cents each. People are still going "Oh yeah, I forgot my bags in the car; I'll just buy some more!" Well... at least they're not plastic. (Anybody who uses Instacart, though, is going to have a dwelling-full of these bags soon ... their ONLY option is to just keep buying bags with each order.)

                          We have other alternatives that cost more (much larger reusable bags that are, IMO, crap; and foldable crates that I think are excellent, and big green bins for families). A couple of times I've tried to talk people with $300+ worth of groceries into the big green bins but for whatever reason, they seem to prefer 15 small bags ....

                          When people knew the End Was Nigh for plastic bags, they were grabbing as many plastic bags as they could. It got to the point where management had to tell us we could no longer sell plastic bags on their own (as in: people would have two bags' worth of groceries but would ask if they could buy 10 more).

                          Quoth Iris Kojiro View Post
                          Back when I worked at The Night Place, we used to knock a nickel off the cost of groceries when a customer brought in a reusable bag.
                          That is a GREAT idea. It's not much but at least the thought is there. Then again, given the restrictions my company has recently put in place (none of which benefit the customer ... surprise, surprise) I don't see them ever agreeing to something like this. What we are allowed to do is give rewards points per bag so ... I am pretty generous with those. (As far as I know we can still do it. Until I hear to the contrary, I will continue doing so.)

                          I do have to say that the 35-cent reusable bags are at least of decent quality.
                          Customer service: More efficient than a Dementor's kiss
                          ~ Mr Hero

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                          • #14
                            I've started using empty berry/cucumber flats from the produce department for larger items like bakery cakes and the value packs of meat (that tend to be too heavy for the bags). Hey, if the boxes are just gonna be recycled anyway... If I'm bagging I'll offer boxes to customers. One day I got creative for a regular pickup customer and made a sturdy paracord sling handle for a box that would have otherwise been hard to manage *wonders if I can claim paracord as a reimbursible supply expense*

                            The company is getting rid of even those 35-cent plastic bags by next month...I don't even know which stores if any still have them (trying to find that out so mom and I can stock up). No plastic at all, and we're charging for the sucky paper bags. The complaints are already coming in from other stores. One customer actually asked why stores can't use boxes...if they decide to do that as policy they'll find a way to charge I bet.
                            Last edited by Dreamstalker; 05-12-2023, 02:06 AM.
                            "I am quite confident that I do exist."
                            "Excuse me, I'm making perfect sense. You're just not keeping up." The Doctor

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