Too Many Tote Bags? Stuff You Can Do With Them!

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Wednesday, 17 July 2019

quote [ Tote bags, like Sephora samples, are irresistible and insidious in equal measure. They are quite useful! They hold such promise for an imagined future! So many of them are free! And almost all of them are impossibly filthy.

There is a reasonable limit to how many tote bags you need in your life, and it’s quite likely that if you’re reading this article, you have a tote bag problem. Does the term “bag of bags” mean anything to you? If you answered yes, please know that you are among friends, and that help is here. ]

Because NYT, full article in extended. I personally thing the best answer is just textile recycling. Using them as gift bags, unless they're high quality, is just pushing the problem onto someone else.

What to Do With All Those Tote Bags
It’s O.K., we all have a problem with them.
By Jolie Kerr
June 3, 2019

How many tote bags do you own?

Reveal

Hmm, yes, you there. I see you trying to dodge the question, and it’s precisely the dodging that tells me you need to hear this difficult truth: Tote bags, like Sephora samples, are irresistible and insidious in equal measure. They are quite useful! They hold such promise for an imagined future! So many of them are free! And almost all of them are impossibly filthy.

There is a reasonable limit to how many tote bags you need in your life, and it’s quite likely that if you’re reading this article, you have a tote bag problem. Does the term “bag of bags” mean anything to you? If you answered yes, please know that you are among friends, and that help is here.

How many tote bags is too many tote bags?
Ann Lightfoot, a professional organizer and a founding partner of Done & Done Home in New York, has some tough love to offer the tote-stashing set.

“Here is the truest thing about totes,” she said, “and we all know it: All totes are not created equally.” Some totes are shoddily made, the handles aren’t long enough or the size of the tote is simply not useful, which, according to Ms. Lightfoot, makes them “clutter at best and actual garbage at worst.”

Left unmanaged, tote bag collections can take over closets, drawers, car trunks — really, any space is a potential tote bag dumping ground. Some people, like Noreen McInnis, 33, a product marketer in Oakland, Calif., have made peace with the state of their vast collections of totes. “I recently realized I can ‘wear’ my enamel pins on my tote bags and now feel justified in continuing to hoard both,” Ms. McInnis said.

But others, like Hannah Campbell, 30, a production editor in New York, said their tote bag collecting comes with a negative side effect.

“I don’t have a single nice-looking bag because my collection of totes makes me feel like I don’t ‘need’ one,” Ms. Campbell said.

So why do we bother holding onto them? “We often get them for free, and so we think, ‘How good does a tote have to be? I didn’t even pay for it,’” Ms. Lightfoot said. “But this is a slippery slope of logic.” Keep only the ones you regularly use, she said, or totes that have some special meaning attached to them. (My ashes will be interred in my Barnard Bookforum tote.)

Your unwanted totes are actually wanted!

The good news for you and your impossibly large tote bag collection is that totes are easy to donate. Perhaps you, like Kate Lion, a 35-year-old homemaker from Boise, Idaho, are ready to start tackling the bags of bags. “I donated four bags of various totes before we moved, then opened up our storage unit to find boxes of totes,” she said. “I think they proliferate in the night.” As Ms. Lion knows, donating is one good option for finding a second life for those boxes of totes.

There are plenty of good uses for your unwanted totes:

- Use them to bring clothing donations to shelters, houses of worship or Goodwill, and leave them as part of the donation.

- Bundle food donations for soup kitchens and food banks in reusable bags instead of disposable ones so the bags can be passed along to patrons.

- If your supermarket has a food bank box, donate extra grocery totes there.

- Donate a stack of clean totes to short-term shelters, libraries, senior centers, preschools or charitable organizations like Bags4Kids.

- Use them in lieu of gift bags when bringing gifts or food to friends and family.

- Totes that are no longer serviceable can still be donated to organizations like ChicoBag’s Pay It Forward program.

But if your tote bag collection makes you happy, and it doesn’t have any ill effects on your life, by all means, well, carry on. Just … one more thing.

Oh, won’t you please clean your tote bags?

Your tote bags are filthy. This is especially true of totes that are used for groceries; these should be cleaned regularly to ensure they remain free of bacteria that cause food-borne illness. (If you’re in the market for a new reusable grocery bag, this guide is for you.)

Nylon and lightweight cotton totes can be machine washed in cold water. Use a stain treatment product on particularly grimy totes; dirt, for example, is a protein stain, so choose an enzymatic pretreatment spray like Zout. For specific and identifiable stains that go beyond mere dirt, use the product best suited to the stain in question. (Need some direction? Start here.) When applying a stain treatment, pay special attention to the handles and bottom corners of the bag, which are likely to be the most in need of stain removal. Grocery totes that cannot be machine washed should still be regularly cleaned, either with an antibacterial wipe or an all-purpose spray.

Drying, however, should be left to nature rather than to machines, so opt for air-drying. Cotton bags tend to be wrinkled after laundering; if this doesn’t bother you, good! If it bothers you, come sit by me and I’ll tell you that you can certainly iron your tote bag — with spray starch, even — and also I will understand you completely.

Heavy canvas totes, such as the much beloved L.L. Bean Boat and Tote, can also be washed in the machine. But, caveat laundror: Machine washing a Boat and Tote is a bit like burying the family kitty in Stephen King’s “Pet Sematary” — it will come back, but it won’t be exactly the same. Washing a heavy canvas bag will soften it up, and it will lose some of its original structure and stiffness.

Another note on washing a heavy canvas bag: Because of its bulk, it can damage other things in the machine, so wash it on its own. And be warned: If you go this route, your bag might come out looking a little mangled. Not to worry; simply reshape the bag into its original form and let it air-dry right-side up.

[SFW] [environment & nature]	[+1 Informative]
[by snowfox@5:06pmGMT]

Comments

Paracetamol said^[1] @ 8:41pm GMT on 17th Jul [Score:1 Informative]

Also note: due to the production eating up many resources, you need to use each bag like a hundred times before it's more eco than a plastic one.

snowfox said @ 5:33pm GMT on 18th Jul [Score:1 Underrated]

People want to "save the earth" with very little effort and via consumerism. Somehow, the answer is always consumerism! Funny that. If we bought less shit we'd have less use for any bags of any sort >_>

But that's unAmerican!

Paracetamol said @ 5:38pm GMT on 18th Jul

Our accountant once joked: No matter how much you save on bargains, you're still spending money.

Wulf said @ 3:12pm GMT on 19th Jul

Agreed. Always my response when a totally useless buy is justified by, "It was only $xx.99" or "It was on sale!"

eggboy said @ 10:08am GMT on 19th Jul

I take it home, then use it as a once-off garbage bag, just as I would have done with the bag that didn't cost me money, or contain 20x as much plastic

mechavolt said @ 12:55pm GMT on 18th Jul [Score:1 Underrated]

Tote bags are stupid. As Paracetamol said, you have to use them a ridiculous amount for it to pay off ecologically. On top of which, they are a public health hazard. In areas where plastic bags have been legally prohibited, food poisoning rates go up significantly. No one cleans their bags, and they are hot beds for cross contamination.

Paracetamol said @ 6:39pm GMT on 18th Jul

Mh, I wouldn't press too hard on the hygiene factor … but you can wash them, right? Or you could use net bags.

mechavolt said @ 8:09pm GMT on 18th Jul

"A 2011 study from scientists at the University of Arizona and Loma Linda University found only 3% of shoppers with multi-use bags said they regularly washed them. The same study found bacteria in 99% of bags tested; half carried coliform bacteria while 8% carried E. coli, an indicator of fecal contamination."

mechanical contrivance said @ 8:12pm GMT on 18th Jul

Why are people pooping in their tote bags?

snowfox said^[1] @ 5:28pm GMT on 18th Jul [Score:1 Informative]

Slate has this to say about the New Yorker tote bag XD

Not the same as New York Times, but still an oddly timely article.

Hugh E. said @ 5:15pm GMT on 17th Jul

Reduce Reuse Recycle: Are in order of effectiveness. Reuse outranks recycle. Thus, "using them as gift bags" is the better thing to do.

snowfox said @ 5:20pm GMT on 17th Jul

But what is the recipient supposed to do? Also use it as a giftbag? At some point there's too many of an item such that re-using it doesn't make sense because there's more of the item than uses for the item (supply-demand). It would make more sense to just recycle it into something that will be used.

mechanical contrivance said @ 5:44pm GMT on 17th Jul

I look forward to seeing you in a dress made of tote bags.

snowfox said @ 6:48pm GMT on 17th Jul

What makes you think I have any knowledge of the textile arts? XD

mechanical contrivance said @ 6:56pm GMT on 17th Jul

Who needs textile arts? Just use duct tape.

cb361 said @ 9:51pm GMT on 17th Jul

Who needs textiles? Just use duct tape.

Ankylosaur said @ 9:54pm GMT on 17th Jul

Who needs duct take? Just go naked.

rylex said @ 11:58pm GMT on 17th Jul

who needs skin? go flayed.

cb361 said @ 6:23am GMT on 18th Jul [Score:1 Funsightful]

It's a great way to reduce your carbon footprint.

mechanical contrivance said @ 1:12pm GMT on 18th Jul [Score:1 Funny]

And your footprints.

Jack Blue said @ 6:54pm GMT on 18th Jul

And your feet.

Wulf said @ 3:13pm GMT on 19th Jul

Have you never re-gifted a gift bag?

snowfox said @ 4:58pm GMT on 19th Jul

Keeping a pile of those things is just clutter and then they're not the right size for what I am giving anyway. So I throw gift bags out.

Paracetamol said @ 8:39pm GMT on 17th Jul

As somebody constantly loosing tote bags, donations of unmodified tote bags are gladly accepted.

Ankylosaur said @ 9:55pm GMT on 17th Jul

Now I'm one tote over the line, sweet Jesus!

Silent said @ 10:50pm GMT on 17th Jul

I am actually really disappointed.
I thought it was going to be "How to make a delightful top" or "Combine three totes and some duct tape into a doomsday weapon" type article.
I always knew I could just foist my unwanted things on other people.

snowfox said @ 5:32pm GMT on 18th Jul

I will find a collection of links to stupid shit people do with tote bags and make you a post ;D

rylex said @ 6:06pm GMT on 18th Jul

first link to stupid things in that collection will be "people buy tote bags"

Silent said @ 8:12am GMT on 20th Jul

You are going to spoil me here. ;)

captainstubing said @ 10:25am GMT on 18th Jul

Cat beds. My cat loves my shopping bags. Once a handle breaks, or it tears, it goes straight on to one of the fat boy's sleeping areas.

1	ScoobySnacks
2	HoZay
3	Paracetamol
4	lilmookieesquire
5	Ankylosaur