Supermarkets dump plastic bags earlier forcing customers to buy bags or bring their own

IT’S been a long time coming, but plastic bags will be now be banned from supermarkets even earlier than expected, forcing grocery shoppers to come armed with their own reusable bags.

EXCLUSIVE

PLASTIC bags will be dumped from supermarkets sooner, forcing grocery shoppers to come armed with their own bags.

Supermarket giant Woolworths has revealed from June 20 single-use plastic bags will no longer be available instore — a move that brings forward the date by 10 days.

Customers shopping at Woolworths supermarkets, BWS, Metro and Woolworths petrol stores must either bring their own bags, purchase thicker reusable bags at 15 cents each or buy canvas bags at 99 cents each.

Woolworths will be banning plastic bags in supermarkets from June 20.

The complete removal of plastic bags will impact more than 800 supermarkets across Victoria, NSW, Qld and WA.

Woolworths chief executive officer Brad Banducci said this will result in more than 3.2 billion single-use plastic bags no longer being required in their stores and will be a huge environmental win.

“Our teams have been working hard behind the scenes to accelerate the rollout of this plan so we can start making a positive impact on the environment as quickly as possible,’’ he said.

Woolworths CEO Brad Banducci said the banning of plastic bags will remove 3.2 billion plastic bags from circulation annually.

“We know this is a big change for our customers and store teams and we need to do all we can to make the transition as seamless as possible for both.”

The gradual phasing out of plastic bags has already begun in 12 Woolworths stores across the country from today including in NSW (Marayong, Greenway Village, Dural, Mullumbimby), Victoria (Wyndham Vale, Taylors Lakes, Toorak), Queensland (Noosa Civic and Mossman) and WA (Singleton, South Fremantle and Cottesloe.)

Concerns have remained around the use of plastic bags because they are not biodegradable and can have devastating impacts on marine wildlife and birds.

Already Queensland and WA have revealed will they be enforcing lightweight plastic bag bans on July 1 under new state laws.

Woolworths is also looking at way to phase out plastic packaging for fruit and vegetables.

In Qld this will extend beyond supermarkets to include convenience stores, takeaway food stores, pharmacies, liquor stores and other retail businesses.

In SA, Tasmania, NT and ACT state legislation already exists that bans plastic bag use.

But Woolworths is preparing for customer backlash and said they will be monitoring the removal of bags closely from their initial dozen stores that have already implementing the dumping of plastic.

Woolworths also confirmed they are trialling the removal or reduction to plastic packaging for fruit and vegetables — already this has been done with products including organic spring onions, celery, kale and English spinach.

Rival supermarket Coles has also previously revealed it too will be dumping plastic bags and this will begin in some stores from April 30 before the entire removal of single-use plastic bags in their Vic, NSW, Qld and WA locations on July 1.

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Originally published as Supermarkets dump plastic bags earlier forcing customers to buy bags or bring their own