CustomEarthPromos - Eco Blog US

Martinez City Council has agreed to purchase 2,000 reusable plastic bags as part of their campaign against single-use plastic or paper bags. These bags are of an extremely high quality and made out of 100 percent recycled plastic. The City Council aims at promoting the ban on plastic bags and encouraging people to use these multiuse shopping bags. City Preps up for the Ban by Using Custom-Made Bags With the ban on plastic bags fast approaching, the Martinez City Council hopes to spread awareness about the benefits of multiuse bags. The amount of plastic that will be used after the ban is imposed will reduce drastically, helping Martinez reduce its pollution and littering problems. The “bottle bag”, as it is commonly known, is made out of recycled plastic bottle content and provides shoppers with a sturdy, high-quality option to carry their shopping in. These bags can also be put into washing machines whenever the owner wishes and can withstand a number of washes without compromising its quality. At no charge to the public, this bag offers the residents of Martinez a real chance to make a difference to their community. For those who are very particular about the style of the bag they use, they needn't worry as this bag has a unique graphic design on one side and educational information on the other. Designed by the students of The New Leaf Sustainable Living Collaborative as part of a contest worth $350 in scholarship funding, this is a great way to promote environmental awareness among the youth as well. Shopping with Custom-Made Bags A plastic shopping bag can take anywhere between 15 to 1,000 years to decompose. Imagine how many years it would take if single-use plastic bags were still being distributed in Martinez. On average, a high-quality reusable bag will have a lifespan of several hundred single-use plastic bags. Shopping with custom-made bags will help all aspects of the environment by reducing the amount of single-use plastic bags that are being consumed. Plastic bags are often dumped in landfills where they pollute the groundwater as well as release a high amount of atmospheric pollution. Use reusable bags to help make a difference to your living community. Source

If you are among those who are environmentally-conscious, you might have probably added a few eco-friendly habits in your lifestyle. If you are not among these folks, it is high time that you started to care about the environment. The key thing is to start small. Start with something as simple as eliminating plastic bags and using wholesale reusable bags. This will help kick-start your eco-friendly life. But then that begs the question: what is an eco-friendly life? The Ideal Eco-Friendly Life As evident from the life of St. Joseph resident, Sharon Gillespie, the ideal eco-friendly lifestyle is built on the concept of reusing and recycling. She recycles everything. She harvests rainwater to water the potted plants in her house. She only uses her reusable bags when she goes shopping to the local grocery stores. She composts yard and fruit waste. She is a retiree and has chosen to live the life that is most beneficial to the environment. But she has been following these eco-friendly habits from years and understands that they cannot be learned in just a day or two. As every great journey begins with a single step, your journey to an ideal eco-friendly life should begin with a reusable bag. Why Wholesale Reusable Bags and an Eco-Friendly Lifestyle? Of all the eco-friendly life habits, using wholesale reusable bags is probably the simplest and cheapest method. However, it also needs the most commitment. Shopping is quite a frequent activity in our lives. Carrying such a reusable bag may not seem fashionable. But are you concerned more about how you are seen, or about the environment? It is a good idea to store a few reusable bags in your car so that you will still have that option, even if you forget to carry one in a hurry. The wholesale reusable bag is not just a simple beginning to an eco-friendly life. It tests your attitude and aptitude towards life, not just yours but also that of others. It trains you to be more concerned and be ready for the choices you will make in the present as well as the future to live an eco-friendly life. Gillespie took the choice to live an eco-friendly life after learning the importance of resources from the lives of her parents, who survived the Great Depression of 1929. You don't need such a drastic event to make that choice for you. All that is needed is a desire to do good and a wholesale reusable bag. Source

Channeling the Assyrian proverb of ‘tell me what company you keep, I shall tell you what you are', researchers at the Harvard Business School (HBS) have found that using reusable grocery bags can influence you to buy buying environment-friendly goods. Uma R Karmarkar, an assistant professor of business administration at HBS, and Bryan Bollinger, an assistant professor of marketing at New York University's Leonard N. Stern School of Business conducted this study. They also found out that these bags can make you buy indulgent goods in some other area, say ice cream and cookies, as compared to other shoppers. Custom Grocery Bag Influences Study Conducted at HBS The study was conducted to determine the psychological factors that drive purchasing decisions of customers. The study was done by conducting a survey. The survey asked participants on how their shopping varied when they brought their own bags. The participants were then tested on how they would behave if they had reusable bags and presented both options: some indulgent treats contrasted against environment-friendly products. They were also tested on the parameter of the price of the goods. Custom Grocery Bag Does Have an Influence The custom grocery bags or the reusable bags, the study concludes, does have an effect on customers in both directions. The study suggests that the bag encourages a person to go for a like-for-like product, that us environment-friendly goods. This act of doing good generates a good mood which prompts the buyer to reward himself/herself, hence, leading to the buying of tasty treats. The study calls this trigger as the ‘licensing effect'. However, Kamarkar does warn that the study does not account for whether customers have been buying more organic products than before, because of the bag. Nor does the study account as to whether the organic products that were bought, were predetermined by customers. But she says that the experiments prove that the custom grocery bag influences people ready to pay more for organic products, rather than go for the alternative choice of treating themselves. However, there is also a flip side to the whole case. The recent practice of many stores, to charge for reusable bags can have a significant negative impact on customers buying organic products. The extra charge feels like a punishment for some, for not bringing a reusable grocery bag. This tends to remove the positive vibe a reusable bag would produce when brought voluntarily. Source

Plastic bags have been a constant nagging concern for environmentalists worldwide. While there have been bans and additional charges imposed on these bags, they continue to pile up in oceans and landfills, deteriorating the state of the environment. Thankfully, researchers have come to our aid by coming up with an innovative way to use these non-biodegradable substances to our benefit. Plastic in Petroleum Products a Reality? The Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC) researchers from the University of Illinois, have discovered ways to transform plastic into petroleum through pyrolysis. Through pyrolysis, plastic bags are heated in a chamber without oxygen to obtain crude oil. While this technique has been previously employed by researchers, the ISTC researchers have gone a step further to fractionate the crude oil to obtain petroleum products. The results of the conversion were products such as naphtha, natural gas, waxes, lubricating oils, diesel, and gasoline. The diesel produced through the process, can be mixed with ultra-low-sulfur diesel and some biodiesel fuel types. The diesel was tested to see if it complied with the US standards. ISTC senior research scientist, Brajendra Kumar Sharma, said that the diesel mixture they produced, had an equal energy content, with an octane number that was higher, and lubricity that was better than that of the ultra-low-sulphur diesel. The research team found that the plastic-converted diesel could be blended with regular diesel without any issues, and the same with biodiesel. Another laudable benefit of the process is, the amount of energy it produces is more than the energy it uses. While petroleum crude oil distillation process gives about 50-55 percent of fuel, this process recovers nearly 80 percent of fuel. Switching from Petroleum Products to Wholesale Reusable Bags Despite these advances in science, a safer choice would be to get used to an eco-friendly alternative to plastic bags. While these ground-breaking discoveries have no doubt brought a positive side of plastic bags to the front for the first time, the non-biodegradable plastic bags still continue to impact our environment negatively. Wholesale reusable bags, on the other hand, are environment-friendly and do not pose a threat to our environment. As people start getting accustomed to using wholesale reusable bags, we can slowly cut down the plastic bag numbers, doing much good to our environment. Source

Eating healthy is a choice many of us would like to make. So what do you do when you want to eat healthy? Stroll over to the section that has a “natural foods” label on them? Sadly, that will make as much of a difference as working out on a static treadmill. “Natural” and “organic” are not the same thing, and with food industries deceptively hiding behind these confusing labels, the consumer has much to know. Raising Public Awareness on These Organic Food Gimmicks The Center for Science in the Public Interest has long been fighting for the case of misleading labels, for the benefit of the public. Executive director, Michael Jacobson, has been working on the subject of deceptive titles such as “whole grains” and “natural”, for decades now. A survey conducted by Consumer reports revealed that nearly one in every three persons who were questioned believed that “natural” and “organic” were the same thing. While organic food has been regulated, and stands for food without synthetic fertilizers that have been produced using approved methods, natural food doesn't have a regulated definition by the FDA (Food and Drug Administration). Many products that come with the tag “natural”, often contain many non-natural ingredients. Jacobson says that it is just a buzz word that these companies use to get the consumers' attention, and many of them are willing to pay a tad bit more for “natural” products. Another term that is trending among product labels is “artisan”. The FDA doesn't have a definition for “artisan” with respect to food labels, despite which there are already about 800 products in the market that bear the new buzzword on their labels. With a plethora of marketing lingo and flashy words being thrown around, the consumer should watch out for ingredient descriptions to figure out what they truly mean. Organic Food with Eco-Friendly Promotional Items While we are on the subject of awareness, let us look into going eco-friendly. Eco-friendly promotional items can be a great way of spreading the word in an environment-friendly way. When compared to hoardings and print ads, eco-friendly promotional items can not only help in getting the word out, but also give you the satisfaction of knowing that you have done your bit in saving the planet. Source

Lacey, like most cities in the country, has decided to ditch plastic bags. Recently, its city council voted in favor of the ordinance that talks about banning plastic bags in the city. Now that the proposal has been accepted, the ban is scheduled to be brought into effect from July 1. Lacey Gives up on Plastic Bags and Supports the Reusable Bag However, it was not an easy task for the supporters of the ordinance to get the idea accepted by all. Those who oppose this proposal, mostly plastic bag manufacturers and certain businesses, wanted the people of the city to voice their opinion about it. As most residents favored the ordinance, it was passed in the council. According to a report by The Olympian, the city was the last big jurisdiction of Thurston County to have passed an ordinance of this sort. Previously, Tumwater, Olympia as well as unincorporated Thurston County had approved similar ordinances. Create Shopping Reusable Bag to Support the Ban Now that the ban is set to be implemented in a few months, residents of the city should start giving up on plastic bags and use reusable bags instead. These eco-friendly bags are not only reusable, but also prove to be much durable than plastic bags. While most plastic bags tear away when filled with heavy groceries or purchases, reusable bags don't. Many stylish and colorful reusable bags are already up for sale in the stores of Lacey, so residents can make their pick accordingly. However, if you would like to go a step ahead and create shopping bag for yourself, even that is simple. Not only will it save you some money, but will also help you customize your bags. Creating your own shopping bag wont even take too much of your time. You essentially need an old cloth or any fabric of your choice. You can use any store-brought reusable bag for cutting out the pattern on the fabric. You will need four cut out pieces of the fabric in total. Two of these pieces will be used for lining the insides of the bags while the other two for the exterior. Once you have the cut outs of both the exterior parts, pin them together and sew both the sides. Follow the same procedure for the interior pieces. Now, open the fabric and iron the seams. Be careful during this step as it is essential to press the seams to get a perfect handcrafted bag. Source

The indiscriminate use of one-time use plastic bags has been a matter of concern for a while now. They are discarded unscrupulously, tossed around by the wind and ultimately settle to pollute the waterways or clog storm drains. These discarded plastic bags cause incalculable damage to the fragile eco-system by virtue of being the least bio-degradable material. Issaquah to Decide the Fate of Reusable Convention Bags Issaquah, Washington is busy trying to enforce a ban on the use of plastic bags, and has left it to the voters to decide. In all probability, the ban should be in place and the use of plastic bags should be done away with soon. However, shoppers will not be put through much trouble as thick, reusable plastic bags can still used, though they will need to shell out 20 cents per bag. The bags will be stocked at store like Front Street Market and Safeway, and lightweight plastic bags can no longer be used by such large retailers. The ban on the use of plastic bags was enforced back in 2013 by the City of Issaquah. Small retailers have time only until July, after which even they cannot use plastic bags. However, Issaquah voters still have it in them to bag the ban. In case it is approved, Proposition 1 as it is called allows the cancellation of the ban on plastic bags. If such a situation arises, it is back to status quo. This will be a big blow to environmentalists and eco-conscious people who worry about the damage plastic waste can cause. However, just as Jennifer Talton who voted “no” because she realizes how good the ban is for the community, it is expected that others too would do the same. This is expected mostly because people hate seeing discarded plastic bags either littering the streets, or clogging the drains and waterways of the city, adding to the woes of the authorities. Then again, people like Scott Gard, who voted “yes” believe that such important decisions should never be allowed to be taken by City Council members on their own. Why Carrying Reusable Convention Bags Is a Better Idea? Although the motive may be noble, it should be left to the voters to decide whether they want a ban or not. Save Our Choice, a group that lead the opposition to the ban, was the same that tried unsuccessfully to stall the ban in Seattle a few years ago. It is for thoughtful citizens to realize that putting reusable convention bags in the place of plastic bags makes a lot more sense in the broader perspective. Source

People are fed up of discarded plastic bags being blown around the streets or clogging waterways and storm drains around the city. The residents of San Antonio believe that it is high time something concrete is done about the plastic bag waste menace that is bugging this city like it does most other cities across the country. No More Plastic Waste After Banning Plastic Bags Cris Medina, district seven Councilman, invited people for a round-table discussion to come up with the best way to handle the alarming situation caused by discarded single-use plastic bags. Medina made sure that local businesses and HEB were well represented for the meeting with the city and community leaders to discuss the merits of switching to re-usable bags. Dya Campos of HEB said that the obvious choice at hand was to phase out plastic bags. How the city authorities are going to go about it was more important, as it should not prove to be too taxing on the customers. The Councilman was of the opinion that the authorities would be able to save clean-up costs once the ban was in force. This would take a load off the neighborhood associations who are currently cleaning up their localities voluntarily. Though enforcing the ban is the ultimate goal, to start with, reducing the usage would be a positive step forward. This, according to Medina, would pave the way for a smooth transition to reusable bags from single-use plastic bags. The very purpose of the round-table initiative was to increase awareness about waste reduction not just amidst the citizens, but also among the children. The schools need to take it upon themselves to adopt reuse and recycling programs and explain the benefits to the children. This will help make the city greener and pave the way to playing a positive role in protecting the fragile eco-system. Shopping with Wholesale Reusable Bags After Banning Plastic Bags The city council on its part needs to educate the public with posters and hoardings. It must seek the active cooperation of retailers and grocery store owners in spreading the benefits of using wholesale reusable bags that could be made available at all stores. Once people get used to the idea of carrying their own bags, banning plastic bags would have served its purpose and the use of plastic bags can be eliminated totally. Time may be allowed for the existing inventory to be exhausted to phase out the plastic bags gradually. Source

What can we do about the mountains of plastics bags that are discarded after use by Americans every year? Though there have been concentrated efforts from every level to arrest this menace by recycling the waste, it is only recently that something concrete has been initiated. Fighting Plastic Bag Waste with Cloth Shopping Bags A group of concerned citizens from Iowa hit the headlines for their initiative to collect discarded plastic bags and turn them into plastic mattresses for thousands of homeless people. This still does not alter the fact that plastics bags mean big business in the country, and will remain that way for quite some time. A research group, IBEXWorld, conducted extensive research and published a report last year with the astounding news that over 3,300 companies are engaged in the business of wholesale plastic disposable bags that account for a whopping $69.5 billion in revenue in the last year alone. With such big money at stake, wishing away this menace of plastic waste is not easy at all. With growing businesses that need packaging products, it is estimated that the demand for both paper packaging and plastic bags is expected to treble in the next five years. This causes concern for the environmentalists who are worried about the damage such huge mountains of plastic waste can cause to the fragile eco-system. This is probably the main reason why the Dallas City Council is intent on banning plastic shopping bags. Los Angeles set the example on New Year's Day by becoming the largest city in the US to ban use-and-throw plastic bags. They provided an alternative by charging customers 10 cents for every paper bag that was used instead. The primary motive of the ordinance was to arrest the negative impact caused by these discarded plastic bags on the environment . The ban affects the local grocery retailers who collectively make annual sales of $2 million, using up rental space to the extent of 10,000 sq ft. The smaller grocery stores not yet in the net are expected to be affected by the ban from July 1. Using Cloth Shopping Bags Instead of Plastic Bags The problem is not insurmountable, as most people would imagine. It takes not just ordinance and legislation from the authorities, but also active participation from the people. If people would consider viable alternatives like using cloth shopping bags instead of the plastic bags they are so used to, the problem can be tackled on a war footing. Source

With the recent ban on plastic shopping bags in Los Angeles, shoppers have no alternative but to use reusable shopping bags to carry their groceries and other purchases. This new amendment is a huge step towards creating a positive impact on the environment and lessening any further harm to the marine life in the area. With paper bags being sold at 10 cents per bag, more shoppers are inclined towards purchasing a reusable and stylish shopping bag that they can carry around with them for all of their shopping needs. Various Reusable Shopping Bag Options With a large number of reusable shopping bags being available in the market, shoppers now have a choice of selecting the kind of bag they want to buy. There are many companies coming up that have started offering different kinds of reusable bags. The bags offers by such companies are sturdy and reusable that can hold all sorts of groceries. Completely eco-friendly, these bags are getting quite popular amongst customers as they are a lot more durable. Tote bags are one of the most popular bags that are available to customers. Big, sturdy and economically viable, these bags are extremely durable and can hold all sorts of heavy items. Some of these bags even have a cardboard layer at the bottom to provide that extra bit of cushioning. There are also many stylish reusable bags available in the market, which come in a variety of colors and designs. The best part about buying these bags is that some of the companies offering them donate one percent of the profits to charities. If you are more of an do-it-yourself enthusiast, you can even create reusable shopping bag. You don't need to put in a lot of effort in that. You primarily just need a few pieces of old clothes. Make a few stitches by cutting out the desired patten and you are good to go. Create Reusable Shopping Bag to Make a Difference Creating reusable shopping bags is now becoming a fashion statement because of the variety of different styles available to the interested ones. These bags not only help save the environment be reducing the amount of plastic bags being consumed, but also bring down the number of paper bags being used. The overall benefit to the environment is huge when you use or create reusable shopping bag. Source