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?

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Gives Away 200,000 Reusable Bags in September; Now it's Up to Shoppers to BYOB

Reusable Bags: News & Views

Thousands of shoppers in California, Nevada and Arizona have one less of an excuse than they did a month ago not to bring their own bag to the grocery store, which Tesco hopes is one of its 168 Fresh & Easy markets.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's neighborhood affairs director Roberto Munoz said today the fresh food and grocery chain handed out over 200,000 free reusable canvas carrier bags to customers last month, between September 15th and September 30th.

The reusable bag Fresh & Easy gave away to shoppers in September is its 99-cent reusable canvas bag (pictured top, left), which as we reported in this piece - December 7, 2008: Fresh & Easy Offers New Definition of 'Double Bagging;' Says Sales of Reusable Bags Has Doubled Since Introducing its 99-Cent Bag in October - the grocery chain introduced in October 2008.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market distributed coupons for the September 2010 free canvas bag promotion, which required a minimum purchase of $10 to get a free bag, via its direct mail advertising flyers, as well as on its website, Facebook page, Twitter feed, and through its 'Friends of Fresh & Easy' e-mail promotional mailer. The reusable bags were also handed out to customers at the fresh food and grocery chain's September 2010 new store grand opening celebrations in California.

800,000 free reusable bags so far

September's wasn't the first reusable bag giveaway Tesco's Fresh & Easy has held. It's offered free bag promotions, usually giving the bag away with a minimum $10 purchase, fairly regularly since introducing its 99-cent canvas bag in October 2008.

And, according to Munoz, the grocery chain has given away about 800,000 reusable shopping bags to shoppers since opening its first stores in November 2007.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market offers a variety of reusable bags in its 168 stores in Southern California and the Central Valley; metro Las Vegas, Nevada; and metro Phoenix, Arizona. In addition to the 99-cent canvas bag, there's also a reusable bag made out of organic canvas, which sells for $2.99, and a reusable canvas bottle bag, which retails for $1.99.

The grocer also offers an inexpensive reusable bag which it calls "bags for life." The bags are made out of a synthetic plastic-type material and sell for 20-cents each. Fresh & Easy offers to replace the bags free of charge when they wear out, hence the name. The 'bags for life" are popular in the United Kingdom, where Fresh & Easy's parent company Tesco is based.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy offers free single-use plastic carrier bags in its stores but doesn't offer free paper grocery sacks as an option, unlike virtually all of its competitors in California, Nevada and Arizona do.

Incentives: Paper, plastic or reusable

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is attempting to get as many customers as it can to BYOB - bring their own bags to the store - through offering a variety of reusable bag options at various price points, it's bag giveaways and promotions, and by other means.

For example, Munoz says Fresh & Easy is also encouraging the use of reusable bags in its stores by adding in-store reminder signage, merchandising reusable bags closer to the checkout stands and giving away magnets featuring messages that remind customers not to forget their reusable bags at home.

Reusable bag use remains low in the U.S.

Despite free bag giveaways like those conducted by Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market and numerous other U.S. grocers, which also offer reusable bags for 99-cents or a dollar, few consumers bring their own bags to the grocery store. Various studies estimate that a mere 5%-10% of Americans regularly bring their own bags with them when they go shopping.

In California, where Tesco has 107 of its 168 (soon to be 155. See:13 Closing Fresh & Easy Stores List) Fresh & Easy stores, promoters of legislation to ban single-use plastic carrier bags were dealt a blow this summer when a bill, AB 1998, designed to do just that, was defeated in the California State Senate. [See - August 31, 2010: Breaking Buzz: California's Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bag Ban Bill Fails.]

Since the defeat of the statewide bill, which was supported by the California Grocers Association, the trade group for grocers doing business in the state, numerous California cities has dusted off plastic bag ban bills which they're now considering proposing. Various sources say four -to- five dozen California municipalities are currently considering single-use plastic carrier bag bans or laws that would charge a fee for the bags. [See - September 3, 2010: How the California Grocers Association and its Members Can Snatch Victory From the Jaws of the Defeat of California's Plastic Bag Ban.]

A few California cities, including San Francisco and Malibu, have had single-use plastic carrier bag ban laws in place for some time. Others, such as Oakland and Manhattan Beach, passed such laws but had them struck down in the courts, in lawsuits filed by the plastic bag industry.

In 2009, the first federal bill that would have placed a fee on single-use plastic carrier bags was killed in committee in the U.S. House of representatives before being able to get a vote on the House floor. [See- April 23, 2009: Virginia Congressman Jim Moran Introduces First-Ever Federal Single-Use Bag Fee Legislation Into U.S. House of Representatives on Earth Day 2009.

Putting the 'PR' in reusable bag use

Reusable bag promotional programs like Fresh & Easy's and those regularly conducted by other food and grocery retailers, along with public relations programs by non-profit groups and others to encourage greater use of reusable bags, are a good and positive thing - the more incentives the better - but until shoppers decide to take personal responsibility (PR) and bring their own bags to the store in greater numbers, not only will we not see much of a trend towards increased reusable bag use, we'll also continue to see state and local governments attempt to influence retailer and consumer behavior by proposing and passing various laws designed to eliminate single-use plastic bags, and in some cases paper bags, and to promote the use of reusable bags via legislation.

Reasonable people can differ on whether or not it's the place of government to tell consumers what kind of carrier bag they can get at the grocery store and to restrict the types of bags retailers can offer to shoppers.

But in the final analysis one thing is clear, as is the case with most forms of behavior change, increasing the use of reusable bags at the grocery store is in the hands of consumers. For example, you can be given a dozen free reusable carrier bags from our favorite grocer but you we don't bring them to the grocery store and use them, which is the case with many consumers, then the incentive is a moot point.

Regular incentives, which we encourage and congratulate grocers and others for promoting, will no doubt increase the use of reusable bags by shoppers, at least incrementally. But until consumers decide to change their collective behavior and BYOB, the percentage will remain low.

Reader Resources

[Fresh & Easy Buzz has written extensively about reusable grocery bags and the single-use bag topic and issue. For a selection of those stories click here, here and here. Use the "Older Posts, "Newer Posts" links at the bottom of the linked pages for additional pages and stories.]

What Happens in Vegas Ends Up in Fresh & Easy Buzz: Las Vegas Shopper Wins Kroger's 2010 Reusable Bag Design Contest

Food and grocery retail company Kroger Co. has named a grand prize winner, four finalists and five runner-up category winners in its 2010 reusable shopping bag design contest.

The grand prize winner in this years bag design contest is Jamie H., from Las Vegas, Nevada. The award winning design (pictured at the end of the story) is very minimalist in design, using black (on a white bag background) text only, with the exception of a small blue and green globe at the end of the text. You can view the grand prize bag here, along with all of the finalist and runner-up bags.

As the grand prize winner, Jamie H, who shops at Kroger's Smith's Food & Drug chain in Las Vegas, gets a $1,000 Kroger gift card. Additionally, the four finalists each receive a $250 Kroger gift card, and the five runners-up each get a $100 gift card.

Who says 'What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas?' It's certainly not the case when it comes to Jamie H, or else Fresh & Easy Buzz wouldn't be telling the tale in our widely-read blog. And forget Vegas secrets: The grand prize-winning reusable bag is set to be sold in select Kroger Co.-owned chains and stores, including at the Smith's Food & Drug stores in Metropolitan Las Vegas, Nevada, according to the company.

Kroger Co. holds the chain-wide reusable bag design contest annually, and has been doing so for a number of years. The contest is part of the retailer's overall sustainability strategy and project. [See: www.kroger.com/green.]

This year, Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, which has 27 of its 159 small-format fresh food and grocery stores in Metro Las Vegas, Nevada (98 in California; 34 in Metro Phoenix, Arizona) followed Kroger's lead and held a reusable shopping bag design contest of its own. [Read our story on the winner: July 27, 2010: The Winner of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's Reusable Bag Design Contest Is... Also see: June 17, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Picks Eight Finalists in its Reusable Bag Design Contest; Website Voting Through June 30 and April 19, 2010: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Joins Kroger Co. in Holding Earth Month-Earth Day Reusable Bag Design Contest.]

Kroger Co., which is the leading supermarket chain and the second-largest retailer of food and groceries in the U.S., after Walmart Stores, Inc., is examining its offering of single-use plastic carrier bags closely. For example, Kroger's Fred Meyer chain, which is headquartered in Oregon and has stores throughout the Pacific Northwest, the Inter-Mountain region and in Alaska, on August 1 eliminated single-use plastic carrier bags at 10 of its stores in Portland, Oregon as a test.

On July 28 of this year, the Portland City Council passed a single-use plastic carrier bag ban. The new city ordinance bans the use of plastic or non-recycled paper carrier bags at grocery stores and pharmacies and requires stores to charge a minimum 5 cent fee for each recycled paper or compostable plastic bag it gives out. Stores are also required to provide free reusable bags to seniors and low-income residents.

The city has put the law on hold pending the vote by the Oregon State Legislature on a similar statewide ban. Portland Mayor Sam Adams said when announcing the hold on the new law that if the statewide plastic bag ban bill doesn't pass, the city will enact its ban, which would become law in 2012.

Ironically, legislation almost identical to the passed City of Portland bag ban law, and Oregon statewide bill yet to be voted on, failed in California on August 31, as we reported - August 31, 2010: Breaking Buzz: California's Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bag Ban Bill Fails. Also see: September 3, 2010: How the California Grocers Association and its Members Can Snatch Victory From the Jaws of the Defeat of California's Plastic Bag Ban.

Meanwhile, reusable bag design contests like those held by Kroger and Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, serve to elevate the concept of using reuseable bags, along with injecting an element of excitement and shopper participation into the process.

Despite considerable education and publicity about reusable bags, and regular giveaways by grocers and others of free bags, the use of the bags remains very low in the U.S. Some studies say only 5% of grocery shoppers overall bring their own bags to the store.

Bottom line: Personal responsibility and initiative by consumers is key to solving the disposable bag issue and increasing the use of reusable bags.

Above: The grand prize winning bag design

Reader Resources:

[Fresh & Easy Buzz has been reporting on, writing about, and offering analysis and opinion on the reusable shopping bag, single-use plastic carrier bag and related topics and issues since early 2008. Click here, here, here and here to read a selection of those posts.]

Kroger's 2010 Reusable Grocery Bag Contest Has Ended; Winners to be Named in July

Leading U.S. food, grocery and general merchandise chain Kroger Co. has ended its 2010 design a grocery shopping bag contest, and will announce the finalists, winner and runners up in July.

Read our April 19, 2010 piece - Tesco's Fresh & Easy Joins Kroger Co. in Holding Earth Month-Earth Day Reusable Bag Design Contest - for details about the 2010 Kroger contest. Also view first place winning bag in the 2009 contest at the link above.

Kroger holds the contest annually. It's open to all members of the public.

You can view the numerous bag design entries in this year's contest here.

Fresh & Easy Buzz will let you know who the winner and honorable mention designers are when Kroger announces them next month.

Kroger Co. is the largest traditional U.S. supermarket chain by annual sales volume, and the number three retailer of food and groceries in the country, after number one Walmart Stores, Inc. and number two Costco Wholesale.

In Southern California, southern Nevada and Arizona, the three states where Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has its 159 stores, Kroger operates the Ralphs Supermarkets and Food 4 Less chains (Southern California and southern Nevada), Smith's Food & Drug (Nevada), Fry's Supermarkets (Arizona) and FoodsCo (California's Central Valley and Northern California).

Reader Note: Related post: June 17, 2010: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Picks Eight Finalists in its Reusable Bag Design Contest; Website Voting Through June 30. Also: Click here for a selection of stories in Fresh & Easy Buzz on the paper or plastic and reusable shopping bag topic and issue.

Competitor News: Kroger Co. Launches Chainwide 'Design Your Own Bag' Contest Promotion; Invites Shoppers to Be 'Part of the Solution'

Green Retailing: Reusable Bag Promotions

As part of its efforts to reduce the number of single-use plastic grocery bags and paper grocery sacks it uses in its stores, and to encourage shoppers to use reusable shopping bags, the Kroger Co. supermarket chain has launched a creative promotion it calls the "Kroger Design Your Own Shopping Bag Contest," in which the grocer is inviting consumers to design their own unique versions of a reusable shopping bags, using simple design tools it is providing on special pages on its Kroger.com Website.

The consumer-interactive bag design contest began on April 6 and runs until May 15, 2009.

Budding reusable shopping bag designers can go to the special Web site page here,which offers a complete description of the contest along with a link to the design template page. (See here as well.) You have to register here to participate in the bag design contest.

The design tools on the site make creating a bag rather simple. A computer, web browser and a little imagination are all that's required.

Once a person creates his or her own bag design and submits it via the Web site page to Kroger, they receive a confirmation e-mail back from the site. The confirmation e-mail includes a picture of the designer's finished bag design. The confirmation e-mail also allows the bag designer to e-mail the finished product to friends, family members and others, who can then vote for his or her bag design in the contest, at a link provided on the confirmation e-mail.

After the contest ends on May 15, a special panel of five judges chosen by Kroger Co. will judge all of the reusable bag designs submitted. According to Kroger, the judges will give special consideration to those bags that have received the most votes from folks like you via the Website page.

The grand prize winner of the design-a-reusable-bag contest will receive a $1,000 Kroger gift card, good at any of the various supermarket chains the company operates throughout the U.S.

Kroger will award gift cards worth $250 each to the four top finalists in the contest, and the five runners up with each will get a $100 Kroger gift card.

That makes for a total of 10 winners: one grand prize winner, four finalists and five runners up.

Kroger will post the bags designed by the top ten winners on its Web site. And the grocery chain says it might feature the grand prize winner's reusable bag for sale in its supermarkets.

But Kroger is making every person who designs a bag and enters the contest a winner of sorts. Each contestant will receive a free reusable shopping bag for entering his or her design in the contest. (The free bag is pictured at left.)

Budding bag designers must have (or get one before you enter) a Kroger rewards card though to get your free bag. Here's what Kroger says about getting your free bag for entering the contest: "To receive a free reusable shopping bag, submit a design and enter your Shopper's Card number, and we'll load a free bag credit on your card ($0.99 value). This offer is limited to one bag per Shopper's Card holder. Bag credit will expire in 30 days."

[All the information needed to get started on designing your bag is here, as is the free bag information.]

[Here is a Web page listing all of the various supermarket banners Kroger Co. operates throughout the U.S. (Look in the top far upper right hand corner of the page where it says "Visit Our Consumer Sites." Click on it and there's a pull down menu of the various chains.) Here is a page to use to locate the specific Kroger Co.-owned and operated stores in the U.S.]

In California, Nevada and Arizona, the three states where Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has its 119 grocery and fresh foods markets, Kroger Co. operates hundreds of supermarkets under the following banners: Ralphs (Southern California, southern Central Valley California); Food 4 Less (Southern California, Nevada); Smith's Food & Drug (Nevada); Fry's (Arizona); Foods Co (Northern California).

Creative, consumer-interactive promotion

Kroger's design-you-own-bag promotion is a creative and interactive way to involve shoppers in the retailer's efforts to reduce single-use bag use in its stores and to promote and encourage increased use by shoppers of reusable bags.

When consumers can be involved in a process or effort (the interactive aspect of the promotion-contest) in such a way -- designing their own bag in this particular case -- they tend to invest much more in the effort. After designing your own reusable shopping bag its a good bet you will think much more about the issue than before you engaged in the creative process and contest, for example.

The reusable bag design contest also helps to raise greater awareness of the entire reusable bag use topic and issue in the U.S., particularly because Kroger is the second-largest national food and grocery retailer in the country after number one Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

Lastly, the contest, and the effort Kroger Co. is putting into it, shows the retailer's corporate commitment to reducing single-use bag use in its stores and encouraging and supporting reusable bag use. (Check out Kroger's "real time" digital-counter here. It provides a running count of how many single-use carrier bags the retailer's supermarkets are saving by encouraging reusable bag use. The single-use bag reduction "real time" counter is part of the company's "Greener World, Simpler Choices" sustainability program.)

If you enter the reusable bag design contest -- best of luck. But even if you don't enter, check out the many creative designs already entered. You can view the bag designs and vote for your favorites here. There currently are nearly 31,000 different consumer-designed bags on the site.

Related Stories and Posts:

>April 30, 2009: iKristen Buys Her Fresh & Easy Bag(s) -- and It's Almost the Right One: A Tale About the Power of Social Media Sites For Grocer-Consumer Interaction

>April 27, 2009: Fresh Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Adds A flickr.com Photo Page to its Social Media Site Portfolio; Now Using Twitter, YouTube and flickr

>April 29, 2009: New York Chain Wegmans Holds Creative Bag Exchange Promotion to Encourage Reusable Bag Use; Reduce Use of Plastic Carrier Bags in Stores

>April 23, 2009: Strategy Session: The In-Store Reusable Bag-Sharing Program -- A Way For Grocers to Significantly Increase Reusable Bag Use Among Shoppers

>April 23, 2009: Virginia Congressman Jim Moran Introduces First-Ever Federal Single-Use Bag Fee Legislation Into U.S. House of Representatives on Earth Day 2009

>April 16, 2009: Two New Bills in California State Assembly Would Put 25-Cent Per Bag Fee on Both Single-Use Plastic and Paper Carrier Bags

>April 22, 2009: Earth Day 2009: California-Based Grocers Conducting A Myriad Of Reusable Bag Promotions Today; Other 'Green' Activities For Earth Day

>April 9, 2009: Competitor News: One Year Since Eliminating Plastic Bags in Stores Whole Foods Market Says Reusable Bag Use Tripled; 150 Million Bags Out of Landfills

>April 21, 2008: Earth Day 2008: Whole Foods Market, Inc. Becomes the First Major U.S. Food and Grocery Retailer to Stop Using Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bags Tomorrow

>April 8, 2009: News & Analysis: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Gets Reprieve As Manhattan Beach, California Plastic Bag Ban Law Held Up By Plastic Bag Industry Group's Lawsuit

>March 19, 2009: Another Tesco Fresh & Easy Future Market City Bans the (Plastic) Bag: No Plastic Carrier Bags In Palo Alto, CA Supermarkets Starting September 18th

>March 7, 2009: Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track

>December 7, 2008: Fresh & Easy Offers New Definition of 'Double Bagging;' Says Sales of Reusable Bags Has Doubled Since Introducing its 99-Cent Bag in October

>August 13, 2008: Tesco to Offer Shoppers Free Plastic Bags in UK Stores Only if Requested; Still Offering Plastic Bags-Only in Fresh & Easy USA Stores; No Paper Option

>August 1, 2008: Bag Bans and Fees: Seattle, Washington Imposes 20-Cent Fee On Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bags; Bans the Use of Foam Meat Trays in Supermarkets

>July 23, 2008: Plastic or Plastic: Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bag Bans in California Cities Threatening Tesco Fresh & Easy's Free 'Plastic Bag-Only' Policy

>September 25, 2008: Competitor News: Wal-Mart Joins Tesco, Others in Announcing A Plastic Bag Reduction Program of its Own

>April 20, 2008: Earth Day 2008: California Bag-Fee Bill AB 2058 Passes California State Assembly Natural Resource Committee; Next Stop Appropriations Committee

>April 21, 2008: Earth Day 2008: City of Los Angeles, CGA and Southern California Grocery Chains Partner in Major Reuseable Shopping Bag Giveaway Promotion

>April 18, 2008: Earth Day 2008: New Issues Are Beginning to Emerge With Growing Consumer Use of Reusable Shopping Bags: Worker Injuries, Shoplifting, 'Double-Bagging'

>April 24, 2008: Legislation: Oakland, California's Plastic Grocery Bag Ban Law Not in the 'Bag' Yet

>April 13, 2008: California State Assembly Natural Resource Committee to Vote on Statewide 25-cent Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bag-Fee on Monday

>March 15, 2008: UK 'Banish The (Plastic) Bags' Campaign Update: Morrison's Latest to Make Announcement; Tesco Holds Firm

>March 5, 2008: Britain's 'Banish The (Plastic) Bag' Campaign and Tesco: London Street Artist 'Celebrates' the Tesco Plastic Bag; More UK Retailers to Charge Bag Fee

>March 8, 2008: More UK Retailers Jump On The 'Banish The (Plastic) Bag' Campaign.

>March 4, 2008: "Message From Across the Pond: Tesco is Right Square in the Middle of the 'Banish the (Plastic) Bags' Campaign in the United Kingdom

>May 1, 2008: Green Retailing Report: UK Supermarket Chain Waitrose Creates A 'Reusable-Bag Only' 'Green' Checkout Lane in One of Its Stores

>April 21, 2008: Earth Day 2008: Massachusetts'-Based Stop & Shop Supermarket Chain and General Mills Launch Free Reusable Shopping Bag Cross-Promotion For Earth Day

[Follow Fresh & Easy Buzz around on Twitter.com at www.twitter.com/freshneasybuzz.]

New York Chain Wegmans Holds Creative Bag Exchange Promotion to Encourage Reusable Bag Use; Reduce Use of Plastic Carrier Bags in Stores

'Green Retailing' -- Reusable Carrier Bag Promotions

The family-owned, upstate New York USA-based Wegmans supermarket chain held a creative customer carrier bag exchange promotion for Earth Day 2009 last week, on Saturday, April 25, in its 72 supermarkets in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania,Virginia, and Maryland.

The award-winning supermarket chain invited shoppers to bring in a single-use plastic carrier bag filled with additional thin plastic bags, and in exchange receive a free Wegmans' reusable canvas shopping bag like the one pictured at the top, which sells for just 99-cents in the stores.

Wegmans' then had all of the single-use plastic grocery bags brought in by shoppers and collected by the stores recycled.

We think the Wegmans' Earth Day-Earth Week event is a creative example of how food retailers can encourage shoppers to use reusable bags, while at the same time doing another good -- collecting a bunch of single-use plastic carrier bags that would most likely have ended up in a landfill but instead were recycled.

The supermarket chain said it decided to hold the event on Saturday rather than on Wednesday, the actual Earth Day, so that it could reach more shoppers. Saturday's are generally the number one grocery shopping day in terms of the number of customers that go to the store.

And of course, the "green bag" promotion's creativity also serves as a smart marketing device for Wegmans, which recently was named the number one supermarket chain in the U.S. by Consumer Reports magazine, based on the non-profit group's extensive national survey of shoppers and their favorite food and grocery stores.

Wegmans' also was named for 2008, and has been for the last 11 years, as one of the top places to work in the U.S. in Fortune magazine's annual "Best Places to Work" survey. Wegmans' was rated by Fortune as the fifth best place to work in America for 2008. The 2008 rankings came out this year. The 2009 rankings come out in 2010.

According to Jason Wadsworth, Wegmans' sustainability specialist (yes, they have one of those), the Saturday, April 25 shopper bag exchange event was a big success. Wegmans' collected bags full of single-use plastic carrier bags and handed out numerous free reusable shopping bags in its 72 stores.

The Saturday bag exchange event was part of a nearly-day long (11 a.m -to- 3 p.m.) Earth Day celebration inall 72 of Wegmans' supermarkets, centered on the what Jason Wadsworth and Wegmans' call "the three R's of environmentalism": Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.

In addition to the bag exchange, the event included tastings of organic and locally-produced foods throughout the stores' aisles from 12 p.m -to- 3 p.m. Saturday, along with educational activities and other in-store "green" happenings stressing those three R's of environmentalism.

"In the nearly 40 years since Earth Day was proclaimed in 1970, many of us have become more aware of how our daily activities can have an impact on the planet – from the kinds of lights we use at home, to the bags we use to carry our purchases, to the kind of car we drive. Earth Day is an annual reminder for people, businesses, and communities to review where things stand and to explore better options," Wadsworth said in explaining the thinking behind Wegmans' Earth Day event on Saturday, April 25.

"Choosing organic foods is another shift toward greater sustainability, and customers were able to sample organic foods throughout the store, while learning about the practices that go into growing and producing these delicious foods. These include innovative technologies to lower energy use, reduce water used for irrigation, and reduce reliance on artificial fertilizers and pesticides," Wadsworth added about the Earth Day event.

Wegmans' first introduced reusable shopping bags into its stores in 2007.

Last year the privately-held supermarket chain, which had estimated 2008 gross sales of a whopping $4.8 billion for its just 72 supermarkets, according to various industry ranking sources, added a new, thicker, stronger plastic bag in its stores as part of its carrier bag offerings, according to Wegmans' sustainability specialist Wadsworth. The thinking behind the introduction being that by adding the stronger plastic carrier bags, more shoppers would ask for them and reuse them, unlike is normally the case with the thinner single-use bags, which generally get tossed in the garbage after consumers unpack their grocery purchases at home.

Wadsworth says that since introducing its various varieties of reusable bags (in 2007), offered at various price points, along with offering the stronger plastic bags last year, the supermarket chain has reduced the volume of the thin, single-use plastic carrier bags it uses in its 72 supermarkets by 30% thus far.

The retailer's goal is to encourage as many of its customers as possible to bring their own reusable bags to the stores, which is why it held the bag exchange event and regularly creates other promotions designed to encourage and increase shopper use of reusable bags.

We think Wegmans' model of offering the bag exchange -- bring a single-use plastic carrier bag full of more single-use plastic carrier bags to the store, get a reusable shopping bag in turn. -- is an excellent model for food and grocery retailers in California, Nevada and Arizona, the three states where Tesco currently has its 119 small-format grocery and fresh foods markets in. For that matter, the reusable bag promotion is a good one for grocery retailers throughout the U.S. and globally to adopt and offer in their stores a few times each year.

The promotion creates shopper awareness, keeps some single-use plastic bags out of landfills and waterways, puts reusable bags into the hands of consumers who likely aren't already using them, and overall increases awareness on the reusable bag use topic.

Single-use plastic carrier bag fee or tax legislation is now on the national agenda in the U.S. House of Representatives [See our April 23, 2009 story here: Virginia Congressman Jim Moran Introduces First-Ever Federal Single-Use Bag Fee Legislation Into U.S. House of Representatives on Earth Day 2009.] The federal legislation would put a 5-cent per bag fee on both plastic grocery bags and paper grocery sacks.

Additionally, for food and grocery retailers in California, the single-use plastic bag issue is heating up once again in a major way. Legislation that would put a 25-cent per bag tax on single-use plastic carrier bags and paper grocery sacks is working its way through the California State Assembly Natural Resources Committee at present. [See our April 16, 2009 report here: Virginia Congressman Jim Moran Introduces First-Ever Federal Single-Use Bag Fee Legislation Into U.S. House of Representatives on Earth Day 2009.]

Because they are in the direct line of fire as the retail format that uses the most plastic bags, food and grocery retailers often get a major part of the blame for the single-use plastic bag problem in the U.S., as well as elsewhere in the world.

Creative promotions like Wegmans' bag exchange therefore a good way for grocers to demonstrate their commitment to reducing plastic and paper bag use and in promoting reusable bags.

We think bag exchange programs modeled on Wegmans' April 25 event offer grocers in California, Nevada and Arizona (and elsewhere), such as Tesco's Fresh & Easy and its competitors, a great tool to promote and encourage greater shopper use of reusable bags. We hope to see bag exchange programs like Wegmans hitting stores in the three states soon.

Related Stories and Posts:

April 23, 2009: Strategy Session: The In-Store Reusable Bag-Sharing Program -- A Way For Grocers to Significantly Increase Reusable Bag Use Among Shoppers

April 23, 2009: Virginia Congressman Jim Moran Introduces First-Ever Federal Single-Use Bag Fee Legislation Into U.S. House of Representatives on Earth Day 2009

April 16, 2009: Two New Bills in California State Assembly Would Put 25-Cent Per Bag Fee on Both Single-Use Plastic and Paper Carrier Bags.

April 22, 2009: Earth Day 2009: California-Based Grocers Conducting A Myriad Of Reusable Bag Promotions Today; Other 'Green' Activities For Earth Day

>April 9, 2009: Competitor News: One Year Since Eliminating Plastic Bags in Stores Whole Foods Market Says Reusable Bag Use Tripled; 150 Million Bags Out of Landfills

>April 21, 2008: Earth Day 2008: Whole Foods Market, Inc. Becomes the First Major U.S. Food and Grocery Retailer to Stop Using Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bags Tomorrow

>April 8, 2009: News & Analysis: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Gets Reprieve As Manhattan Beach, California Plastic Bag Ban Law Held Up By Plastic Bag Industry Group's Lawsuit

>March 19, 2009: Another Tesco Fresh & Easy Future Market City Bans the (Plastic) Bag: No Plastic Carrier Bags In Palo Alto, CA Supermarkets Starting September 18th

>March 7, 2009: Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track

>December 7, 2008: Fresh & Easy Offers New Definition of 'Double Bagging;' Says Sales of Reusable Bags Has Doubled Since Introducing its 99-Cent Bag in October

>August 13, 2008: Tesco to Offer Shoppers Free Plastic Bags in UK Stores Only if Requested; Still Offering Plastic Bags-Only in Fresh & Easy USA Stores; No Paper Option

>August 1, 2008: Bag Bans and Fees: Seattle, Washington Imposes 20-Cent Fee On Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bags; Bans the Use of Foam Meat Trays in Supermarkets

>July 23, 2008: Plastic or Plastic: Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bag Bans in California Cities Threatening Tesco Fresh & Easy's Free 'Plastic Bag-Only' Policy

>September 25, 2008: Competitor News: Wal-Mart Joins Tesco, Others in Announcing A Plastic Bag Reduction Program of its Own

>April 20, 2008: Earth Day 2008: California Bag-Fee Bill AB 2058 Passes California State Assembly Natural Resource Committee; Next Stop Appropriations Committee

>April 21, 2008: Earth Day 2008: City of Los Angeles, CGA and Southern California Grocery Chains Partner in Major Reuseable Shopping Bag Giveaway Promotion

>April 18, 2008: Earth Day 2008: New Issues Are Beginning to Emerge With Growing Consumer Use of Reusable Shopping Bags: Worker Injuries, Shoplifting, 'Double-Bagging'

>April 24, 2008: Legislation: Oakland, California's Plastic Grocery Bag Ban Law Not in the 'Bag' Yet

>April 13, 2008: California State Assembly Natural Resource Committee to Vote on Statewide 25-cent Single-Use Plastic Carrier Bag-Fee on Monday

>March 15, 2008: UK 'Banish The (Plastic) Bags' Campaign Update: Morrison's Latest to Make Announcement; Tesco Holds Firm

>March 5, 2008: Britain's 'Banish The (Plastic) Bag' Campaign and Tesco: London Street Artist 'Celebrates' the Tesco Plastic Bag; More UK Retailers to Charge Bag Fee

>March 8, 2008: More UK Retailers Jump On The 'Banish The (Plastic) Bag' Campaign.

>March 4, 2008: "Message From Across the Pond: Tesco is Right Square in the Middle of the 'Banish the (Plastic) Bags' Campaign in the United Kingdom

>May 1, 2008: Green Retailing Report: UK Supermarket Chain Waitrose Creates A 'Reusable-Bag Only' 'Green' Checkout Lane in One of Its Stores

>April 21, 2008: Earth Day 2008: Massachusetts'-Based Stop & Shop Supermarket Chain and General Mills Launch Free Reusable Shopping Bag Cross-Promotion For Earth Day

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