Ok, I am just as green conscious as the next person. But there is a time and place for everything. The news is full of panic about germs and diseases going around, yet consumers want to use cloth bags and make cashiers use them to bag their groceries.
When Grocery stores started introducing their cloth bags for shopping instead of using plastic it seemed like the way to go. But did they really think this one out? At least plastic bags are sanitary before use more so than cloth bags. Let me explain.
I am a cashier for a busy retail store. I handle more dirty cash all day long. Let’s face it, money isn’t clean and we don’t know where it has been last. I cringe at some of the hands that hand me money along with the money itself. I keep a bottle of hand sanitizer next to me at all times.
Throughout the course of the day, I hear “I brought my own cloth bags.” But where have those bags been lately? In the trunk of your car that carried the antifreeze last week when your car overheated? Or perhaps along with the last load of mulch you just shoveled in the trunk for lack of bins or Grandma’s feet stomped on them on the floor near the back seat and the candy wrappers the kids left there were stuck to them.
Nevertheless, the cloth bags that I am required to stuff with your groceries are screaming with germs and are filthy. I am required to touch these bags on a routine basis day after day along with the dirty money. SANITARY just become obsolete in the public dictionary.
I certainly can’t use hand sanitizer on your cloth bags, although the thought has crossed my mind. Has it ever occurred to anyone that these can be washed? They don’t have to be dried; they can hang and dry on their own.
These are the times that I wish consumers would just use the plastic bags. They may not keep the environment from having to deal with one more bag, but they would definitely save cashiers from getting some unknown skin disease or illness in a world where we can’t afford another disaster.
