In the fruit market on the weekend, as the cashier carefully packed our luscious-looking peaches, tomatoes, green and yellow beans, we talked about the BYOB* situation.
Like other places, our city has decided that plastic shopping bags will carry a $.05 charge to discourage their use, and encourage people to BYOB**.
Our greengrocer clerk had recently been shopping for clothes, provided her own bag, and was very dismayed that "they didn't even wrap it". She was missing the careful wrapping in tissue paper, and then packing of her recent purchases. Purchases which cost a lot more than peaches.
"They basically just handed me the clothes to pack myself", she said. She also pointed out that the major chain grocer just up the street does a much better job of using the BYO bags than this, and that "Clothes are really expensive; they should be treated special".
As we come to grips with reducing our impact on the planet, many strange things will happen under the green banner. As you and your organization figure out how to comply, don't forget to look after the details of the customer experience.
*Bring Your Own Bag
** Thereby reducing the use of something that is multi-use -- a plastic shopping bag -- and replacing it with single-use plastic, such as kitchen catchers garbage bags and the like. But it played well to the public. Now we are learning that re-usable grocery bags are a potential source of toxic germs and need to be regularly washed or otherwise cleaned.
