Save $100 and Your Health, One Reusable Bag At A Time

Why you should care

Minimize plastic use with this quick sandwich bag can save waste and money.

by Katherine Gibbs Contributor

A Simple, Affordable Solution To Cure Our Waste Woes

By 2050 there will be more plastic in our oceans than fish. How depressing!

However, here’s a simple solution to reduce your personal plastic waste footprint and put almost $100 a year back into your pocket. How? It’s as simple as using a reusable sandwich bag.

Although there are many types and brands of reusable bags — all better than a single-use plastic bag — I’ll be focusing on ChicoBag’s reusable Snacktime sandwich bags because we find these to be particularly user-friendly, long-lasting, and stylish. Shout out to ChicoBag for having a Hey Social Good Gold Giveback Medal and a Silver Sustainability Medal! 

One Reusable Sandwich Bag Can Divert 300 Single-Use Plastic Baggies From Our Landfills and Waterways.

Your Health Savings

On average, one reusable ChicoBag Snacktime sandwich bag diverts up to 300 single-use plastic sandwich baggies from landfills, storm drains and oceans. Since landfills are typically between 15 to 30 miles away from your home, this means each person is throwing away approximately 300 plastic sandwich baggies per year into a landfill near their home or workplace. Plastic is made from polyethylene and does not decompose. This plastic waste remains in our landfills for 500+ years, degrading into smaller particles, which can leak into our soil and water. Plastic bags are often washed away into storm drains and end up in our oceans causing toxicity and death to sea life. By simply using one reusable Snacktime sandwich bag, you can divert 300 traditional polyethylene based plastic baggies from our landfills and waterways, help improve drinking water quality and the ocean health we rely on for food and recreation.

Your Pocket Savings

Yes, using a reusable bag will add dollars to your wallet! You get significant cost savings from making a habit of using better eco-alternatives, such as the ChicoBag Snacktime sandwich bag. For example, if you replace a typical plastic sandwich baggie with a reusable Snacktime sandwich bag every day of the year, you save $24.21. If four people in your household replace a plastic sandwich bag with a reusable Snacktime sandwich bag every day of the year, you save $96.84 per year. It’s true, $100 is not going to pay your college tuition or your mortgage, but here’s what you could buy with the savings:

• 2 Southwest Tickets ($49 each)
• Gas and snacks for a road trip!
• Date night for two — fancy dinner and a movie!
• 1 ticket to Disneyland

This is an easy win for your Health, Planet and Pocket. Now, when did ziploc bags ever buy you a night out on the town?!

Why did we select the ChicoBag reusable sandwich bag?

We are inspired by ChicoBag’s commitment to help us achieve zero waste by offering all kinds of bag alternatives (grocery bags, totes, produce bags, etc.), adopting sustainable friendly practices, and working with recycled plastic. We also appreciate their efforts to determine the reusability of their bags (e.g., how many single use plastic bags can one ChicoBag replace). ChicoBag set a mission to reduce over a billion tons of trash to our environment every year. And they are doing it! Another big plus is their public transparency with their suppliers in China. Check out their supplier, Bruce, who does beekeeping when not making reusable bags.

Katherine Gibbs contributed to this piece and conducted impact research during her internship with Hove Social Good. Katherine graduated from UCLA’s Fielding School of Public Health with her Master’s of Science in Environmental Health and is certified a Leaders in Sustainability. Contact Katherine’s LinkedIn

The US currently has over 3400 active landfills and over 10,000 closed landfills. USEPA March 29, 2016 MWS Fact Sheets by State.

This article was first published in Medium.

Keywords: Reusable Bags; eco-friendly bag; zero waste; plastic free kitchen; plastic bags; single-use plastic; reduce waste; reduce trash