A Sobeys shopper with a reusable shopping bag. Image: Submitted, Sobeys
Last July, Sobeys announced it would be removing single-use plastic grocery bags from all Sobeys grocery stores by the end of January 2020. Now that day has finally come.
On January 31, the company will remove all plastic grocery bags from its 255 Sobeys stores across Canada. It’s the first national Canadian grocery retailer to ban single-use plastic bags, which will take 225 million plastic grocery bags out of circulation each year.
Sobeys is encouraging customers to bring their own reusable bags when they shop. Stores across Canada will also be selling large reusable grocery bags for 99 cents, smaller reusable bags for 25 cents, and paper bags are available for 10 cents, with a portion of paper bag sales going to plant trees in Canada.
Sobeys spokesperson Violet MacLeod says if customers have a stash of single-use plastic bags, the company can help you recycle them.
“We’re looking for ways to innovate and to help Canadians across the country find ways to recycle those responsibly,” said MacLeod in an interview last week. “We will still have our bins at store locations for customers to bring in their single-use plastic check out bags, and we will take them away and recycle them properly,” she said.
A version of this story was published in Huddle, an online business news publication based in Saint John. Huddle is an Acadia Broadcasting content partner.
