These canvas shopping bags are about 20 years old. They belonged to my mom; proof we’ve been living green before I even knew what it meant.
The average reusable bag has the lifespan of over seven hundred disposable plastic bags.
I love the fact they have lasted so long! Canvas shopping bags are the best; their durability is obvious. I’ve seen some reusable bags that were poorly made and had holes or broken handles within a year.
The red is even still bright!
Using canvas bags can save an average of 425 plastic bags per person, annually!
Our “vintage” bags (as the store clerk calls them) only recently broke a couple straps. We load them up pretty heavily and the stress started to show in two of the 8 bags’ handles.
Their canvas material makes them easy to repair: I just overlapped the two halfs of the broken handle by a few inches, and machine-sewed vertically and horizontally until it felt good and secure. Nothing fancy and it shortened the handles a bit but it extended their use at least another decade!
An estimated one million birds and 100,000 turtles and other sea animals die of starvation each year after ingesting discarded plastic bags which block their digestive tracks.
Other than some day owning family heirloom bags, want some more interesting reasons to switch to reusable bags? Click here:
My name is Tara. I am a mama and a lover, a full-time nomad, a passionate devourer of Life and an Organic Life Coach.
I’m sure a reusable bag is good for a LOT more than 700 plastic bags. Like you said it can replace 400+ annually, and I’d estimate that the ones we have (these) will last a lifetime.
I still don’t understand why people put up with plastic bags when using a real bag is far superior. Then again, I don’t understand why styrofoam packaging still exists either. Or why people buy bottled water. Etc etc etc. I think everyone is insane.
FYI, something is weird with your comment box. If I type more than a few lines it disappears below the bottom of the box into no man’s land, and no scroll bar appears! Eeek!
While I’m at it, it’s not doing line breaks properly either (there should be a blank line between this paragraph and the preceding one, but there isn’t).
awesome! I love that you have had yours for so long. I hope mine last that long – so far, so good.
I recently has a bus door slam shut on one of my shopping bags with me holding on to the straps as the bus took off up the street. It’s probably a good thing that they broke easily
I haven’t fixed it. I still use it to get potatoes from next door.
Ben, I think the quote was meant to imply ONE bag will last through the use of 700+ trips, while a supply of bags will save 400+ bags a year. But yes, with care and fixing up when necessary, they should last a lot longer than that!
I wish that I had always used reusable shopping bags. Maybe then I wouldn’t keep forgetting to bring them! I’ve ended up just reusing paper grocery bags until they die. Not as good as a canvas bag, obviously, but way better than plastic! Sometimes I still forget to bring a bag or tell them I don’t need one, and so I’ve ended up with a bunch of plastic bags that are hanging out in a bin waiting to be recycled. I really need to get used to toting a canvas bag around!