Woolworths are in the planning stages of offering paper shopping bags.
The article on Woolworths paper bags is a farce and a con.
Firstly, they get single use plastic bags banned and save millions, then they sell us reusable plastic bags for 15c which take many more times the energy to make than single use and they probably buy for 2 cents.
Now they want to sell us single use paper bags for 20c which at the most would cost 1 to 5 c in the quantity they buy.
some 50 years ago we owned and operated a Supermarket in Brisbane.
Guess what? All groceries were packed in paper bags and no charge for the bag (we used also to carry the groceries out to the cars for the customer thats another story). Oh and of course a fee of 20 cents for the order to be delivered to the customers home.
Guess who is having a lend of who?
And we the customer just accept it and Woolworths profits grow bigger.
Did you also know that Woolworths and Coles are behind the push to get single use plastic bags banned altogether in NSW meaning the local fruit and veg, butcher, fish shop will no longer to offer a packaging service for their produce.
Think about the power Woolworths and Coles wield on our daily life in the guise of saving the planet.
Do you detect the cynic in me? The whole thing is a shame designed to enhance their profits and not the world.
Meanwhile they continue to screw milk producers down to unsustainable prices and dairy farmers are going broke very clever.
Have you noticed also how they have done away with butcher shops in their stores , which employed many butchers.
My guess is that 90% of meat is now delivered all prepacked.
Woolworths and Coles are also screwing the manufactures and suppliers.
A new product just does not appear on their shelves, unless of course the manufacture/ supplier is prepared to pay a new line fee.
Now who do you think is paying that fee..... Yes!!! you and I in the product wholesale price.
Boy it would be great to see a Royal Commission into the practices and mode of operation of all the Supermarket operatorsin Australia.
Oh!!!! for a Wilma Ward or a Gabby Horan to keep these bastards honest.
They were the housewife's champion back in the 1970????? in Queensland.
The paper bags funny enough, are not as green as the old single use plastic bags.
There was a study done on all the different options and the results were very surprising.
Plastic bags are not green and we should be cutting out as much plastic use as possible.
The supermarkets don't give a rat's about the environment and only stopped using them in the states that didn't ban single use bags because it's a simpler business practice to operate the same way everywhere.
I agree the charge on paper bags are joke. The images I saw a few nights ago looked like they had handles, upping the cost.
We use calico and hessian bags. They are washable and easy on your hands when loaded.
I think, if we really want to make change, or be serious about it, the produce should all come in bulk bins, and the consumer fills their own bags with what they want to buy, picking out of the bin. Do away with all packaging where possible.
Personally I don't care if they do away with single use plastic bags altogether. I am already in the habit of carrying one of those 'green' bags, although in my case it is 'black'. A bit dressier Goes with most things as well I have my wallet, keys small bottle of hand sanitiser etc etc in it. I then have it ready to put anything I buy in it as well. I usually have at least another bag in the bag. Going in the supermarket, I take extra in with me. It's now a habit.
I prefer the 'black' green bag as I just can't bring myself to use a 'man' bag
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It's all a con. So they ban single use bags. Next time you shop have a hard look at almost everything in the supermarket. It comes in plastic. Fruit n veg bags are plastic. Pre wrapped veggies etc. Box of cereal has a plastic bag in it. Meat is wrapped in plastic. Etc etc etc. The supermarkets are now making money out of our stupidity.
We lived in the USA for many years. The supermarkets offered a paper or plastic option at the register. No charge. If you had your own bags they gave a 20cents a bag discount. Yes they discounted for not supplying a bag.
Plastic isn't the problem. It's folks who throw it away that is the problem. Ask yourself when was the last time you witnessed a plastic bag and/or straw make a break for it and run away.
Ahhhh humbug.
The biggest con as you put it is that they ( the Government) are allowing the use of non recyclable plastics to continue to be used in all sorts of packaging. As for the banning of single use plastic bags, good bring it on.
A single use plastic bag will take anything from 10 years to 100's of years to break down depending on how it is manufactured a paper bag a couple of weeks in a compost heap or landfill, most of us have recycling now so how is the single use plastic bag more green then a paper one
Paper bags made from recycled paper and cardboard or could be made from bamboo hemp jute etc. giving farmers another source of income.
They sell bacon that is a health Hazard. So much water pumped in, when it's in the frying pan it Spits at you and you get plastered with hot water/fat. There is an upside in that for them too, you have to buy more cleaning stuff to clean the top of the cooker.
They even have data tables to follow so the "Drip" figures aren't too high. That the amount of water that drips out of the meat in transit is not too much. I kid you not.
This could go in so many directions and end up in a huge slinging match putting Doodoos on supermarkets, suppliers and manufacturers for all different types of single use plastics
Adding to the con they still sell plastic bags to put our rubbish in, scented ones at that..........
Not forgetting all the new and improved plastic wraps to keep things fresh
They sell bacon that is a health Hazard. So much water pumped in, when it's in the frying pan it Spits at you and you get plastered with hot water/fat. There is an upside in that for them too, you have to buy more cleaning stuff to clean the top of the cooker.
They even have data tables to follow so the "Drip" figures aren't too high. That the amount of water that drips out of the meat in transit is not too much. I kid you not.
Cynical.
Oh Yes but for a good reason.
Bulls sell for more money than cows or steers, WHY? because bull meat holds more added water than other meat in the manufacture of patties. [fact not fiction.]
I wish they would just make up their minds
It's causing too many problems for our grubberment
Do they use paper bags?
Do they use plastic bags?
Do they use Aldi bags?
Just make up their minds so our grubberment can work out which bags to take their bribes in and get on with destroying the country.
I am old enough to remember, the days before brown paper and plastic bags My mum, like other mums of that era, had their own shopping bags
The man who is credited with inventing the plastic bag, did so to help the environment He thought that people would keep reusing the plastic bag, and not throw them away after just one use
Back in the real world, as my wife is now happy to use her own shopping bags, I doubt if she will want any brown paper bags On the other hand She just may think that 20 cents for a brown paper bag, to put over my head, from time to time, was money well spent
If you saw the report on the news this week from a whistleblower and the "Laundering" of money in a Crown Casino where the video clip shows a Blue Cool bag chock full of $100 bills being exchanged for Chips.
Conspiracy theorists never get over their paranoia. They just keep finding new things to fixate on while conveniently forgetting their own unsustainable habits (such as driving around the countryside in heavy vehicles)
Quote, "A new product just does not appear on their shelves, unless of course the manufacture/ supplier is prepared to pay a new line fee.
Now who do you think is paying that fee..... Yes!!! you and I in the product wholesale price."
I was told by a supermarket manager, that the supplier also pays for shelving position, i.e. Hi, lo or mid "eye level".
Hi Iana.
For the record, I was the State Sales Manager of a major national food company back in the 1980-1990.
Back then we were perhaps the 3rd largest supplier of dry groceries products in the supermarket business.
Not only was there a new line fee but also a huge fee to have ones products promoted on special.
This fee was known as Co-operative Advertising and all up equal to about 5% discount to the retailer.
Shelf space then was a premium and although we considered paying for space for our huge range of products it never eventuated.
Remember the Dollar dazzlers and Red spot Specials with two chains. Well they carried a huge over and above fee to have you product included in the promotion.
However, having said that, we would be fools not to partake in the promotions and they reaped us huge volume sales.
Oh Yes!!! Those big displayed on the end of the aisles were given to the supplier for nothing.
IN the trade, these gondola ends were known as Prostitute Ends, as if you wanted to get your END in .......that store, you had to pay for it.
Perhaps times have changed, but I think it maybe even more prevalent today.
The muscle these big guys have is aligned similar to the Petrol Companies,
But that is a topic for another thread.
Only because of convenience we are guilty of shopping with one of the major chains.
The wheel has turned full cycle for me, my mother used to use 'string bags' the introduction of plastic seemed to eradicate their usefullness, however, I now use the good old 'string bags' as I purchased about 15 of them for a 'song' online and gave several to my kids to use.
I can't understand why they have never been reintroduced, they are re useable, cheap, practical and non polluting!
No problem with carrots, haven't lost one yet and It will be a long way off before they ever stop supplying some form of bag or container to carry loose beans etc. anyway.
The wheel has turned full cycle for me, my mother used to use 'string bags' the introduction of plastic seemed to eradicate their usefullness, however, I now use the good old 'string bags' as I purchased about 15 of them for a 'song' online and gave several to my kids to use.
I can't understand why they have never been reintroduced, they are re useable, cheap, practical and non polluting!
The reason there is a shortage of sting bags. BBC The Goodies, the string sheiks are stockpiling mountains of string in the desert. Holes in sting shopping bags were getting larger so they are useless!
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...................... my mother used to use 'string bags' ..........................
When I was in my mid-teens in 1960, Mum used to give me four string bags and send me off on my bike to the local corner store about two miles away. I'd have a list and would cycle home with two string bags full of the weeks groceries hanging off each of the handlebars!
A few years later when I married in the early 70's, my wife and I can distinctly remember the local supermarket had a sectioned off part of the front of the store between the checkouts and the front doors that held dozens and dozens of discarded cardboard boxes - as my wife was processing the weeks groceries, I'd go over to the 'store' and grab two or three decent size cardboard boxes, load our groceries into them and carry out to the car. I don't know why supermarkets can't revisit this method, as it worked very well all those years ago, it got rid of their cardboard box waste - ........... and NO plastic bags in sight !.
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Wondering about ShortNorth ? - Short North is the railwayman's nickname for the NSWGR main line between Sydney and Newcastle
Goes with most things as well 
She just may think that 20 cents for a brown paper bag, to put over my head, from time to time, was money well spent 
