UPDATE: Coles has performed a rarely-seen double backflip, and will be banning free plastic bags from August 29th onwards.
Both Coles and Woolworths removed single-use plastic bags from their stores on July 1, 2018, but granted customers a temporary get-out-of-jail-free card to allow time to transition from single-use plastic to reusable shopping bags.
Woolworths’ grace period lasted ten days, and Coles, whose was meant to end yesterday, announced they would wave their 15c single-use plastic bag fee indefinitely and reintroduce thicker plastic bags because shoppers were finding it ‘too tricky to remember to bring their reusable bags when shopping’.
Only a month after Coles introduced a ban on single-use plastic bags in stores nationally, customer backlash pressured the spineless supermarket giant into reintroducing bags for free, indefinitely.
Customers in NSW, VIC, WA and QLD will now have nothing to pay when they get to the checkout at Coles, while shoppers in SA, TAS and the ACT will still have to pay the meagre 15c-per-bag fee.
Woolworths, however, claim their customers have had no such troubles and will maintain their stance on helping consumers embrace a more sustainable way of shopping. Coles’ backflip prompted Woolworths to reaffirm its stance on removing single-use plastic bags from stores Australia-wide. 12,500 customers were surveyed in May by Woolworths in regards to the plastic bag ban. Results showed that almost 75 percent of customers supported the transition to reusable plastic bags, while less than 15 percent were opposed.
Plastic bag bans have been successfully implemented in various locations Australia-wide, including South Australia, without fuss.
A Change.org petition was established yesterday calling for a boycott of the supermarket until the ban is reinstated.
Via Pedestrian.
