Customer-Designed Reusable Shopping Bag Now On Sale At Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Stores

In July of 2010, Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market announced the winner of its reusable shopping bag design contest - Los Angeles resident Josephine Close - as we wrote about in this story: July 27, 2010 - The Winner of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's Reusable Bag Design Contest Is...

Ms. Close, who won a $5,000 Fresh & Easy gift card for her efforts, was chosen as the contest's grand prize winner from among a group of finalists, all of whom created interesting reusable bag designs. [See - June 17, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Picks Eight Finalists in its Reusable Bag Design Contest; Website Voting Through June 30.]

In our July 27, 2010 story we noted that the winning bag design was being turned into a reusable shopping bag, which would be offered for sale in Tesco's Fresh & Easy stores in California, Nevada and Arizona.

That's now happened: The paisley-design reusable shopping bags (pictured at top), which evoke a bit of a 1960's retro-look, are being offered for sale in all 156 of Tesco's Fresh & Easy markets beginning this week, for a mere 79 cents each.

At that reasonable price we suspect bag designer Close will see her finished product in the hands of numerous shoppers over the next few months, not only in Fresh & Easy stores, but at other grocery markets, farmers' markets and, if she uses public transportation in Los Angeles, in the hands of more than one bus and metro rail line car rider.

Here's what Roberto Munoz, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's director of neighborhood affairs says about the design-a-bag contest, which lead to the winning bag by Los Angeles resident Josephine Close: "We set out to design a desirable and affordable bag people actually want to use and re-use, and we turned to our customers for inspiration," said Roberto Munoz, Fresh & Easy Director of Neighborhood Affairs. "Based on sales of the bag already, we know customers like the design and the price point. We hope this new bag will continue to encourage customers to use fewer single-use bags in exchange for reusable options."

We have one burning question though for reusable shopping bag designer Josephine Close, in case she happens to read this piece: "How many of your attractive, retro-looking reusable shopping bags were you able to fill with groceries, using your $5,000 Fresh & Easy gift card?