Reusable shopping bags revisited

Here are some corrections to my previous post, "Please be a good neighbor, Fairway," in which I complained that Fairway Market in Paramus doesn't reward shoppers for bringing reusable bags.

I wrote that ShopRite stores deduct 15 cents for each bag, but that is incorrect. They deduct 5 cents for each bag. Whole Foods Market in Paramus deducts 10 cents for each bag. Trader Joe's in Paramus gives you no credit at all. ShopRite is alone in accepting plastic bags for recycling. Whole Foods' reusable bags are oversized and beautifully decorated.

Trader Joe's does enter your name into a lottery for a free reusable bag. The odds of winning can't be too favorable, though. I've entered at least three times in the past year with no result.

No answer from Fairway's corporate office

The Fairway supermarket in Red Hook, Brooklyn. (Wikipedia)

Since receiving no reward for bringing reusable bags to Fairway Market in Paramus, I have been trying to find out the reason for the store policy. (See earlier post, "Please be a good neighbor, Fairway.")

I called on Wednesday and asked for the store manager, but was told he wasn't in and that I could speak to the floor manager. 

When I asked him why Fairway didn't give customers a token payment for each reusable shopping bag, he said that is a "corporate" decision and that "corporate" would have to tell the Paramus store to reward shoppers for not using plastic bags. 

He gave me the number for the corporate office in the city.

I called Wednesday and today, and was switched to the voice mail of "Vladimir." He has yet to return my call. 

Not only is Fairway's Paramus store at variance with the practice of ShopRite, Whole Foods, Trader Joe's and other markets, Fairway also doesn't take back plastic bags for recycling, as ShopRite stores have done for years.

Please be a good neighbor, Fairway

I brought a bunch of reusable bags with me on my $100 shopping trip to Fairway Market in Paramus yesterday. But the cashier didn't give me credit for the bags. Why isn't New York-based Fairway Market giving its North Jersey shoppers an incentive to reduce their use of plastic bags? (See last post, "Trying to warm up to Fairway Market in Paramus.")

I'm convinced the plastic bag will be the last thing left after life ends, with tens of thousands of them blowing around as evidence of our rampant consumerism. Reusable shopping bags are larger and hold more. There are quilted ones for cold items, too. They just make so much sense, as long as you remember to take them into the supermarket, which is not as easy as it sounds.

ShopRite gives customers 5 cents back, not 15 cents, as I write peviously, for each reusable bag. Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, Stop and Shop and other markets do likewise, though the amount varies.

And high and mighty Fairway? Here's another example of why many of us are slowly souring on the food-shopping experience at its new store in Paramus.

-- VICTOR E. SASSON