[emiliobumachar]

Crap. Most of the substitutes have a bigger ecological footprint, even if you don't care at all about cost and comfort. Those reusable shopping bags need to be actually reused, several dozen if not hundreds of times, to be ecological. How many times have you used your last one?

[DataDive]

> Those reusable shopping bags [...] How many times have you used your last one?

This reply blew my mind ... when you realize someone must have the exact opposite experience ...

of course I use the reusable bags,

they are in the trunk, and first step after pulling into the parking spot is to take these out the trunk and head into the store

in the last 5 years used only my reusable shopping bag every time except in a few cases when I forgot to put the bags back in the trunk for some reason (usually, I needed to transport bigger things)

[AlexandrB]

> How many times have you used your last one?

Every shopping trip for 4 years now. It tore, but my partner was able to patch it since it's made of pretty good quality fabric.

[drivebyhooting]

Have you smelled them? Do you wash them?

[abdullahkhalids]

I use reusable bags for many years as well, and I wash them every so often. I of course, wash all the produce before using anyway, so a little bit of dirtiness of the bag is negligible.

[AlexandrB]

Yes and yes. It's fabric - you just stick it in the washing machine.

[lxgr]

> Most of the substitutes have a bigger ecological footprint

Only if you insist on single-use things, in many cases. A reasonable substitute for a single-use plastic bag isn't a single-use paper bag: It's a multi-use bag.

> even if you don't care at all about cost and comfort.

I care a lot about comfort, which is why a single-use utensil ban can't come soon enough in the US.

[Carrok]

This argument is so absurd. I have reused my reusable bags more times than I can possibly count. It's really not hard or unrealistic. How does everyone else seem to have such a hard time with this?

[doug_durham]

To pile on here. I reuse my reusable bags hundreds if not thousands of times. I purchased a set of high quality bags that stuff into a small bag. They are better in all ways than any other bags I've used. The ergonomics are excellent.

[ok123456]

Substitutes like reusing shipping boxes like they do at Costco?