Plastic bag ban influences shoppers in Palm Desert
Two valley grocery stores on one street follow different rules.
“I wouldn’t have realized it until you brought it up,” saidCharles Maguire of Indio.
People who shop at Alberstons on Washington in Palm Desert bring their own shopping bags or they pay for them.
“I’m a creature of habit so paying a dime for a bag because I have to because I didn’t bring my own well that’s not going to kill me and I’ll just remember the next time,” added Maguire.
But, across the street at Ralphs in Bermuda Dunes they are free.
“I was thinking about that,” said Diana Brooks. “Thinking stores should be keeping track of how many customers they’re losing because people are going to cross the street and go to another store.”
Of course, people had different opinions on Palm Desert’s new plastic bag ban.
“I don’t like the plastic bag ban,” added Maguire. “I think I’m spending enough money in the stores to get my products put in the bag.”
“Regardless of where I’m shopping I always have my reusable bag,” saidAna Beaty of Bermuda Dunes.
Although the ban is in place, some stores do still sell reusable and more durable bags.
“I asked what happened to the ban on plastic and she just said that’s the way it is plastic or paper ten cents a bag,” said Brooks.
The argument is plastic bags can be harmful to the environment. Some agree.
“I think every store should have reusable bags and get rid of all the plastic bags no matter what city or town your living in,” concluded Beaty.
Others think it’s garbage.
“It was good for the environment thirty or forty years ago when they went from paper bags to recyclable plastic bags and all of a sudden that’s not good enough so I don’t believe that at all,” concluded Brooks.
