It's the only planet we have folks!

The New Straits Times in Malaysia opened a debate on the issue. Some interesting comments came up:

“We can’t completely do without them. Only a really naive person would think so. It would be great if we could reduce 80 to 90 per cent of irresponsible usage”. — is the sensible suggestion from reader Gurmit Singh.

He’s bang on. Ireland put a tax on them and usage dropped 90% in one year.

“THERE’S no way we can live without plastic bags today” says Cindy Chin, “why” she asks “would I swap for something else, especially when plastic bags are given free everywhere?”

That’s the problem. They’re perceived to be free.

They’re not, of course. The retailer buys the bag at a low price, but the real cost is what happens after the bag is used and thrown away. Since we use one or two plastic bags at a time, we can’t see the staggering numbers that are thrown away and are becoming a blight on our world.

They don’t biodegrade for hundreds of years so they pile up and pile up and choke either pant life or animal life. Thousands and thousands of innocent creatures are dying painful, premature deaths every day.

But like most people, Cindy doesn’t see the consequences and she thinks they’re free.

Reusable bags are the only answer. Even when they are made from water resistant plastic coated polyester. Because the number of times they are reused makes them far more environment friendly than the use-once-and-throw-away variety.

At http://www.badlani.com/bags we offer a vast range of bags made from cotton, jute, polyester, and polypropylene. Reuse is what we say.

Expecting people to perceive the whole problem and switch voluntarily appears to be naïve. A tax, like Ireland imposed, is the sensible answer.

Just read an amusing blog by a lady who lives in California discussing the proposed tax on plastic bags there. Here is an excerpt:

“This is where the urge to slap someone comes in.
 

Harvard Business School has a wonderful resource for all businesses, large and small.

Access is absolutely free. I strongly recommend reading it regularly. Lots of useful stuff there. Here's the link http://hbswk.hbs.edu/index.jhtml

Read one article and it will make you think and grope in your mind for answers. But the next article may just answer those questions.

Professor Gerald Zaltman has written a book called “How Customers Think: Essential Insights into the Mind of the Market”. That, as we all agree, is the holy grail. That’s where purchase decisions are made.

The trick, says Professor Zaltman, is to look for relevant, basic emotions that have been overlooked by other brands in the category.

Hmmm, you might think, as I did, what would be the relevant emotions my business could look for, stuff that my competition is overlooking?

An article by Professor Mukti Khaire answers our question. She believes growth comes from by developing intangible social resources such as legitimacy, status, and reputation.

Kind of answers the question, doesn’t it? Now what can you do that would confer these attributes to your business?

I’ve always felt that Google answered this question best. Do stuff that benefits everybody; all your stakeholders which includes the community you do business in, be perceived as really good guys and keep it simple!

Plastic bags are doing untold harm to our planet and your stakeholders are fast becoming more aware of this. Making available reusable fabric bags in any manner – whether you give them away as premiums, distribute them at trade shows and events or even sell them at cost –will get you the positive image attributes Prof Khaire talks about.

Can you afford to do this? See how economical and attractive reusable cloth bags can be at http://www.badlani.com/bags

Can a simple bag achieve this kind of impact? Ask yourself what you think of businesses that do a lot of common good even while promoting themselves. That will answer your question.

So suppose you could afford just 1000 cotton bags, what visibility would that get you? Do the math. They get reused maybe 400 times each, and every time someone carries it around, it gets seen by a couple of hundred people.

That’s 200 x 400 eyeballs. Great branding value.

Talk to us. We’ll work with you to plan an affordable and effective plan for your business.

An article in today’s Yomiuri Shimbun said 55% of Japanese shoppers want plastic bags to be taxed.

They voted to support a government plan to reduce garbage by having supermarkets and other retailers charge customers for plastic bags, according to the results of a Cabinet Office survey.

Only 22 percent disagreed with the plan, the office said.

Talk about a mature society. Contrast this with California, where a majority appear to be against a tax, and India, where people flout the laws against plastic bags every day.

One million plastic bags are being thrown away every minute of the day and night. This is endangering the lives of animals and marine creatures all over the world and putting an unbearable burden on our planet.

No wonder the Japanese succeed at everything they do. The world has a lot to learn from them.

Plastic bags offer a utility for just a few minutes and the cost of that convenience is way too high. Reusable cloth bags are the answer. See how economical and attractive they are at http://www.badlani.com/bags

Scotland is fortunate to have media that have taken cognizance of the harm that plastic bags do to the environment.

The Edinburgh Evening News has taken up this issue and launched a 6 week campaign through the city's major supermarkets to encourage more shoppers to buy stronger re-usable bags costing a few pence each.

The campaign is being spearheaded by the environmental group Waste and Resource Action Programme, with Edinburgh chosen as one of two UK cities to pilot the scheme. If it is successful and enough shoppers are persuaded to switch it may be rolled out to other cities.

A 10p tax on plastic bags is under discussion at the moment. Such a bag tax would raise an estimated £450,000 each year.

Across the Irish Sea the "plastax" as it has become known has seen the demand for plastic bags fall by a staggering 90 per cent.

The problem is gigantic.

In the UK alone supermarkets give away 17.5 billion of them a year, with the average shopper taking home around seven each week. Six out of ten shoppers in Edinburgh arrive at supermarkets and shops expecting to be given free bags to ferry the shopping home.

Most inevitably end up in the dustbin and ultimately find their way to a landfill site where this buried rubbish will take more than 100 years to decompose.

Until the late 70’s no one gave away plastic bags - and everyone either managed with a paper bag or carried a tote.

The world chugged along just fine and folks shopped as enthusiastically as they do today.

The doomsday types claim folks will stop shopping if they aren’t given free plastic bags. Utter nonsense. Check with the folks in Ireland. Have they all closed up shop and gone home? Are you kidding?

Plastic bags are just a habit. If they aren’t available, people will not even think of them. That babe who needs a new outfit for next Saturday is going to buy that outfit. You think she goes shopping because she gets a free shopping bag?

Especially when she can carry her shopping home in a lovely reusable cloth bag; the type you’ll see at http://www.badlani.com/bags

This morning my daughter Kaajal got a mail from a customer in Akron, Ohio, which said this

“I am absolutely delighted! Please let us put a testimonial on your web site. You have been wonderful to work with, and the product is terrific. I'm still amazed that in this new world of ours we have managed to find our product in India and buy it with the same ease as driving to the nearest town. Thanks so much, Ellen”

You made our day, Ellen. Thank you! This is what we live for – to please our customers.

We’re proud that we make very good bags, but we’re even more proud that someone in Akron, Ohio finds it so easy to work with us.

Please send us a picture of yourself with your bag, Ellen. Meanwhile, here’s a picture of Kaajal in her office which I took as she was inspecting a bag before it went to a customer.

You’ll find a large variety of bags shown at our website http://www.badlani.com/bags Talk to us. We’ll do everything we can to make you feel the same way Ellen does.

City councils everywhere today have to address the question of what to do with discarded plastic bags.

Collecting them and transporting them to landfills is costing money. Lots of it. So much, in fact, that California calculated the cost at 17 cents per bag.

 

So, they proposed a tax of 17 cents per plastic bag. There is much opposition because citizens feel the cost of shopping will go up.

Perhaps councils could look at other examples of how some communities across the world have addressed this problem.

Ireland imposed a tax and cut plastic bag usage by 90%. Clearly, popular or not, it works. Taiwan has cut plastic bag usage 80%.

But some Australian communities have succeeded followed the voluntary route.

The city of Coles Bay led the way with local bakery owner Ben Kearney pushing for a reusable bag that every citizen bought and used. Coles Bay just celebrated their 1st plastic free anniversary and they believe they’ve saved their community from using more than 350000 plastic bags. Ben won the Tasmanian of the Year award for his efforts.

Fitzroy Falls is another Australian community that has proudly declared itself plastic bag free. They got local students to do designs and ordered bags that citizens bought through local retailers.

Then, 13 city councils got together under the Northern Inland Regional Waste Group and invested in buying 86,000 reusable fabric bags to be given away free to all their citizens. Everyone is proudly using them and they’ve also become virtually plastic bag free.

Granted, these are small communities where it is easier to get consensus.

Most American city council managers will be surprised to hear that some US communities have also succeeded in ridding themselves of plastic bags.

Galena, Alaska, a village of 850 also banned plastic bags. With a grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the council handed out 2,000 free canvas bags and phased out plastics in the town's three stores. To date, nearly 40 other Alaskan villages have followed suit, said Bill Stokes of Palmer, Alaska, who helped formulate many of the bans with the state's Department of Environmental Conservation.

Most Americans have the impression that reusable bags are expensive. They aren’t. Particularly when imported in bulk.

At http://www.badlani.com/bags you will see more than a dozen alternatives that can be got at less than a dollar each.

Amitabh Bachan, one of India’s most popular movie stars, hosts KBC (Kaun Banega Crorepati), and it is watched by an audience of many millions.

Yesterday evening I was thrilled to hear him start the show by asking folks to think about what happens to all the plastic bags they throw away.

As a people we are notoriously unconcerned about civic issues (look how clean everyone’s homes are on the inside and see how they carelessly throw garbage right outside their own doors).

But what the Big B says is considered gospel and I hope people paid attention to what he was saying.

Thank you, Amitabh.

We need lots and lots of influential people like you speaking up on the subject.

The sad thing is that everyone appears to think that paper bags are the only alternative. They’re not and because they are used just once, they are also wasteful. Reusable cloth bags are a much better answer.

See a vast array at http://www.badlani.com/bags