Designer bag hysteria at Whole Foods: "I'm not a plastic bag"

CNNMoney: Designer bag hysteria at Whole Foods
Organic retailer offers reusable canvas bags designed by Anya Hindmarch for $15 in northeastern stores.
By Chris Zappone, CNNMoney.com staff writer
July 18 2007


The Anya Hindmarch-designed bag.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Entrances to Whole Foods locations in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut swarmed with shoppers Wednesday morning who had lined up to buy limited-edition canvas bags designed by (British designer) Anya Hindmarch.

Whole Foods' four New York City locations each had about 2,900 bags to sell to the first shoppers who arrived, according to a Whole Foods spokesman Fred Shanks. Suburban stores had only 300 bags available.

The light brown bags - emblazoned with the words, "I'm not a plastic bag," in blue letters - are designed to raise awareness of the environmental impact of plastic bags.

The small number of bags, priced at $15 each, did little to dissuade interest.

Whole Foods' Edgewater, N.J.-location had more than 300 people waiting in the rain, according to Shanks.

The organic grocer's Union Square location in New York reported a line of 500 people, Shanks said.

The promotion comes after an earlier one in London, where similar bags with brown lettering went on sale first in designer Hindmarch's stores and then in a promotion at U.K. grocer Sainsbury's, Shanks said.

Riot police reportedly had to be called in Asia after the bag went on sale at Hindmarch's locations there and crowds got unruly.

The grocery chain has no plans at this time to sell the Anya Hindmarch bags elsewhere, according to Shanks....

http://money.cnn.com/2007/07/18/news/companies/whole_foods/index.htm?cnn=yes

The natives are getting uppity again....

:eyes:

And I keep them in my trunk in case I need to go to the store. It's a great idea, especially because they offer the bags at the checkout.

They're just regular totes with the WF logo.

They didn't stop me or say anything, but the cashier and bagger looked at me like I'd handed them a flaming bag of poop. Why do they care? Do they own Albertson's stock or something?

I've googled and the best I can find 'em at is 2.98 if I buy a 100

:shrug:

It's some kind of woven material. I'm not sure what it is, exactly. But they're strong, so they do the trick.

It's a series problem.

How's it going?

I bet you could get canvas grocery bags for 25 cents a piece at a thrift shop, if you don't have a bunch lying around already. Or else you could buy some for $5 or so a piece from reusablebags.com or some such place.

Still, it's a nice sturdy bag - I don't think those handles will ever fall off. But it's still part of this weird idea that you have to spend money to conserve.

using canvas bags of all types. At least, that was her hope, I read in an interview recently.

I just don't want people thinking they have to spend that kind of money if they want to bring their own bags to the grocery store. It doesn't have to cost much at all.

we don't have a Whole Foods here so I haven't seen them.

I'm not sure what they are made of exactly.

They even have varieties--one with slots for holding wine bottles, one that folds into a neat little square, and the standard square bottomed ones, all for less than $1.50 each and they credit customers 5 cents for using them rather than getting paper or plastic.

Whole Foods has one of the best plastic bags in the business --- it's not one of those flimsy little flyaway deals. One can actually carry groceries in them without double bagging.

it seems like we'd be better off completely changing the way we look at ourselves as consumers. The whole idea of buying a designer bag is that something is worth more simply because of who made it. That buying the right thing is cool. I think it would do more for the environment if we looked at ways to make bags, get bags that have already been produced for some other reason, or something else that involves not buying something new. And if we do buy something new, buy something made from recycled materials locally, or at least be conscious of what our choice entails. I understand that this makes it more interesting and raises awareness about the issue, but there's some level of irony in it too. Does the article say where the bags were made and where the materials came from? How much energy was used in their production and in shipping?

and this British designer, whose bags normally sell for hundreds of dollars, just saw this as a gesture she could make that might raise awareness, and encourage people to use canvas bags. Probably too much to hope for, but maybe this "hysteria" could lead others to ideas such as yours for large-scale production and/or use of reusable bags, and they'll eventually replace plastic.

not this limited edition of $15 bags.

Great idea !

so shit like this doesn't happen. The biggest Canadian grocery retailer, Loblaws, have been running similar 'ads' in the business sections here.

Just outlaw the use of plastic bags for this retail purpose.

The 'stakeholders' in those gigantic industries have more than enough access to brains and resources to make it work on their nickel for a change. They think environmentalists are idiots out to destroy the world and don't generally listen anyway.

Fine.

Deal with it themselves. Just outlaw them.

Anyone who is serious about this is ALREADY using their PRODUCED multi-purpose backsacks, reuseables, slashbags, saddlebags, etc etc.

People buy these things -- the company offsets their 'bag' costs ALWAYS and causes more 'damage' by producing them en masse -- they are generally bigger, so you can get more junk into them, so they are heavier and so people abandon them anyway. Or don't bother with it on 'this trip' because it's ONLY a couple of things.

Let's face it -- if there are still idiots out there that need to be fooled into not using plastic, in every way they can, then bribing them with a designer label on a canvas bag is NOT likely to ever change their habit.

Banning it will.

That's my solution to the newsprint problem as well!!

Give them a firm deadline -- the paper must be 'nerfed' and they DO have the resources to already deal with that -- if not, go practice your free speech on the Internet or better manage your electronic holdings -- add bonus: the public would start the view the internet as a necessity and then attacks by the corps on principles like 'net neutrality' would be more difficult.

Everything that goes around, comes around...people have to just start making an honest conscious effort to see the connections.