Why Coles, Why?

Back on the 20th of June was the end of single use plastic bags in Woolworths, Coles was to follow and by the 1st of July every state and territory would be plastic bag free. South Australia, Tasmania and the Nothern Terrtitory had been bag free for some time.

On the 5th of July Coles said it will be giving the most common 15 cent recyclable bags for free. This was meant to run through to July the 8th, It is now the 1st of August Coles is still allowing free reuseable bags and now the media is on the hype train.

coles re useable bag
Coles re-useable bag

You may think good on Coles for offering free bags to customers but it truely is a step backwards. The plastic bag ban came in to protect the environment. The thinner disposable bags got outlawed and in their place came thicker re-usable ones. Costing 15 cents, they had clearly the branding of either Coles or Woolworths on them. These re-useable bags are said to never break down and are worse for the environment.

Its now well established this move by Coles in making these un-evironmentally friendly bags disposable will be hurting the environment more than the old disposable bags. These bags are also free advertising and product placement for Coles. The drawcard of getting free bags from Coles will also be enough to get consumers in through the doors to shop at Coles rather than Woolworths.

Why are you actually doing this?

Seriously no excuse would be good enough for Coles to explain why its still giving out these bags for free. It does seem an underdog marketing tactic rather than customer care. We have had plenty of time to adapt to bag free registers and a few days of free bags is good enough. Yet Coles thinks its a great idea to flood the country with these thick red bags.

The move to be bag free was done for a reason and Coles has decided not to follow it. It really is 1 step forward 2 steps back. When i initially made a post about this move i was concerned it was just revenue raising and i certainly didnt think a month plus after the switch Coles would be still pushing free bags out the door.

Going backwards

Enough is enough Coles if your customers arent “smart” enough to remember to bring their re-usable bags that they got for free then charge them. Dont reward the lazy. Follow the original principle of this bag free move and stop giving them out for free.

Edit- 2nd of August Coles has now come out and said it will begin charging customers for re-usable bags (as was meant to be) from the 29th of August. Another month of these thick bags running rampant in society.