AIBU? No carrier bags in Boots

glammanana OH will walk round our local town with his clothes purchases under his arm rather than buy a carrier!!

I've used reusables since day 1 and have selection of carriers from all the major supermarkets, never bought an extra ever! What p****d me off a couple of months ago was when I went into Sainsbury's and there was the curt notice saying they'd removed plastic bags for fruit and veg - buy a reusable for 30p. There had been no notices in advance warning the customer that it was happening so you could bring your own so I went down the road to Aldi.

It has helped me to spend less as I have so many bags at home that if I don't have enough bags with me It makes me think twice about what I'm buying and become more selective.

I hate putting nice items in grocery shop bags too so again it helps as I do not have many bags for special purchases nor for large items.

Craftyone, I see a gap in the market for shopping baskets. You?

Exactly Glamma. It just doesn't work does it?

Yeah. Go to Lush and get bars of shampoo and bodywash.

I always have a folded bag in the side of my handbag when ever I go shopping but last week I decided to go into Next to buy some PJ's I didn't want to put them in the carrier I had brought with me as I was unsure if it had previously been used for veg etc so I paid for one of their own bags,there was no way I was walking home with a set of pj's under my arm in the rain.

It's a bit rich, though isn't it, for Boots to pretend to be all environmentally aware and hand out paper bags, saying they haven't any large reusable) plastic bags.

Why? Because their gift sets, similar to the ones fizzers bought, are probably all filled with toiletries in plastic bottles.

Things can get wet in the rain in a basket. Ditched my gondola one years ago.

I think fizzers did have 'normal' sized bags but they weren't big enough for her purchases. We live and learn.

fizzers- why didn't you take your own bags to the shops- it is not difficult, is it?

To be fair to Fizzers it is always a shock when you post something expecting agreement and support and nobody agrees with you. I have been there - once.

The best thing to do is swallow hard and say nothing.

I like baskets too craftyone but theyre not very practical for a family sized shop.

I noriced the paper ones at our branch yesterday. However people were buying armfuls of giftboxes and even the big bags werent big enough and were struggling to leave!!

Its ironic that they are switching to these whe their pharmacies seem to be chamging from paper bags to plastic!!!

alexa, I still use an old style basket, I love using them and have 4 in various sizes. I use one as a shopping basket in store, pay for the goods and then put them back into my basket. Two of them are 20 years old. I am surprised not to see anyone else using a basket

I bought an expensive jacket as a Xmas gift for someone in JL the other day. I had to pay for an oversized placcy bag. No way was I going to carry a £115 jacket home without a bag.

We have got dependent on plastic. It is too late to completely turn the tide. Just can't be done. Face it.

Councils need to widen their recycling ablities.

It was a difficult one. I acknowledge that.

Fizzers
I will not STFU, particularly when it comes to environmental issues. People with your attitude towards this problem are doing untold damage.

I hope you are a lot younger than me as you will be the one suffering, not me.

I have sympathy with fizzers. She’s said she takes bags when going shopping. This was a one off. She hadn’t planned to buy oversized gift sets, too big for the bags she had with her, and had to carry them out in the rain (presumably using both hands, so not able to hold an umbrella). I’ve had similar situations in the past and the store’s just found a bin liner out back, which yes, I’ve reused. Boots have been unhelpful, imo.

fizzers Sat 23-Nov-19 09:22:31
STFU Petra and go and sort out that big chip on your shoulder

Blimey Fizzers where did that come from?
Yes, YABU , much as I miss those lovely big rectangular paper bags I used to get with purchases from the likes of JL surely none of us expects plastic carriers these days?
I have various thin nylon bags which roll up into the size of a sausage and I always have one in my handbag.
Our mothers’ generation used to have things called “shopping bags” which lived in the kitchen for whoever was going shopping to take.
It’s not going to save the planet by itself, but I am glad we are at least aware of the creeping menace of plastic.

fizzers not only AUBU regarding your original question you are also being rude, offensive and very ignorant about the urgent environmental need for multi-use shopping bags and accepting your personal responsibilities in this area. As we all must do.

I've still got my old string bag Elegran. Must be getting on for fifty years old now.

I am even older, Elegran, and I took an actual basket until the 1970s. My last actual basket was one I'd bought in Spain and it held an awful lot of groceries.

I think it is more of a problem when you are buying clothing, especially for presents. At least John Lewis have the decency to wrap the item in a nice bit of tissue paper to protect it when it joins the rest of your shopping in your own bag.

I think, before the advent of carrier bags, Boots would have put those items in a paper bag similar to the ones you get in the greengrocers, and then you would put them in your own shopping bag/basket.

I think it is more worrying that Boots had simply forgotten to order more plastic bags. Perhaps they shouldn't be using them at all for hard goods.

How old are you, *Fizzer? A lot younger than me, I think. Earlier in my lifetime it was normal for people to expect to make their own plans to carry home their purchases.

If you were getting the week's groceries you took a roomy shopper with a string bag for extras tucked inside it, and perhaps an older, scruffier shopper for the potatoes and other vegetables - which were emptied straight into it after they were weighed, mud and all. After all, you were going to wash them before cooking.

If you nipped out in your lunch hour for a few essentials, you just had the string bag.

If you bought on impulse then you put up with the inconvenience of getting your stuff home and vowed not to do it again, and you carried the receipt conspicuously so as not to be accused of theft. Meanwhile the shop assistants (and anyone else watching) privately thought you a feckless spendthrift for not being prepared.

Than came the convenience and sheer luxury of plastic to wrap ready-made food and provide a never-ending supply of carrier bags. As a result, more than one generation has forgotten how to prepare food and how to be prepared themselves for acquiring it and other goods. Now it has dawned on most of the world how wasteful and environmentally damaging it is to throw away tons of the stuff every day.