LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Here's a real plastic bag option

Posted

To the editor:

(re: “Don’t sack plastic bags yet,” March 29)

In your recent editorial, you argue that New York residents need an alternative to plastic bags before we can discard them. You explain your criteria for an alternative includes the alternative being flexible in size and easy to carry to stores. You tell us that we do not now have such an alternative to plastic.

I was surprised to read this because I have happily been using such an alternative, ChicoBags, for more than five years.

“In early 2004,” Andy Keller, the creator of ChicoBags writes, “I took a trip to the local landfill after spending the day landscaping my backyard. I was horrified by how many single-use bags filled the scene. Plastic bags blanketed the landscape in a thin mix of white and beige plastic.

“On my way home, I continued to notice plastic bags everywhere — caught in trees, and on fence posts, half-drowned in gutter puddles, and blowing in the streets like urban tumbleweeds. 

I vowed to stop using single-use bags for good. Inspired, I dropped a few bucks on a secondhand sewing machine and began sewing what would ultimately become the first ChicoBag brand reusable.”

Mr. Keller created an almost weightless, washable, attractive flexible bag that easily is carried in its own 2- to 4-inch pouch to a store, and strong and flexible enough to carry a few or more purchases. We can easily fit ChicoBags into a coat pocket or pocketbook, backpack, briefcase, etc., thus preventing plastic bags from destroying ocean and shore lives, further negatively impacting all life on Earth.

Why haven’t the corporate media informed us about ChicoBags? A very important topic for another time. In the meantime, I believe that many readers will be happy The Riverdale Press is informing them that we do have an alternative to what those who market plastics want us to believe.

ChicoBags are available online, and at least one megastore in the Riverdale area.

Elizabeth Shanklin

Elizabeth Shanklin

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