ChicoBag or Plastic?

Recently I’ve been busy trying to finish up articles for this blog and a newsletter, but after checking yesterday’s headline, I decided to write up a quick article on the subject. This story involved our school, specifically our fundraising efforts done by selling environmentally friendly reusable ChicoBags at Farmer’s Market, by stating to the public the impact we have on our environment using plastic bags. Within the three years we have done this fundraising project, we have raised over $3000 that helped pay for a snow trip to the Sierra Nevadas last year. Also, we have helped people use fewer plastic bags by showing them the convenience of ChicoBags; being both easy to carry with their foldable pouch to bag size, or their strength higher than using two plastic bags at once. However, plastic bag manufacturers have claimed that ChicoBags are hurting their business and the facts we announce to people are myths. Personally, I find that these claims are untrue facts they use to persuade people away from other businesses to keep theirs’ growing. They have thrown a blind eye to the negative impact plastic has already caused the environment.

            ChicoBag founder, Andy Keller, made the reusable bags after witnessing the messy area plastic bags made in a landfill, describing the scene as ”All the plastic bags visually monopolized my view and I couldn’t believe it. I looked at the tractors and saw the bags caught on the machinery, I saw the bags blowing around, caught on fences, and birds pecking at them (Keller).” ChicoBags are made out of durable and washable polyester, are able to stuff into their built-in pouch and fold into a full-sized shopping bag that can hold up to 25lbs. Keller started selling his prototype from the back of his car at the Chico farmer’s Market in 2004. In the ensuing years the sales amplified, earning millions of profit last year. He made different sizes and styles, and used the marketing campaign of “fashionable, environmentally friendly reusable shopping bags and lifestyles totes (Keller).” The mission of ChicoBags is “to inspire humanity to adopt a healthy reusable bag habit by making it easy for people to say no to single-use-bags, not just sometimes but every time! We care about offering effective solutions to better your life and our world.”

            Plastic bag companies, however, say that Keller’s products have caused a large amount of lost business. Hilex Poly Company, LLC Superbag Operating, LTD, and Advance Polybag, Inc. want ChicoBag to pay for lack of sales. They claim the information he describes of plastic bag pollution is false, despite Keller’s sources having come from the Environmental Protection Agency and National Geographic. The plastic bag manufacturers have filed a lawsuit for a jury trial in South Carolina, as suspected by Keller, was done there because of the lack of “anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit against Public Participation)” laws. SLAPP allows corporations to censor, intimidate, and silence critics with a potential cost of legal defense. Hilex hopes that the court’s judgment is “ordering the Defendant to pay Plaintiffs the profit made by the defendant, any damages sustained by Plaintiffs, trebled, and cost of the action caused by Defendant’s false and misleading advertising and promotion…” Association of plastic manufacturers including Hilex called Save the Plastic Bag Coalition, say the facts about negative impacts of plastic bags are a myth and trumpets its successes in preventing bans on plastic bags in Los Angeles, San Jose, Marin County, Palo Alto, Mountain View, Santa Monica, and others. An example would be how the three companies sued the City of Oakland, which was considering a similar ban of plastic bags like San Francisco, but withdrew.

            Keller was asked if the lawsuit will affect Martinez students in our fundraising efforts, and said, “We need all the friends we can get at this point.” My teacher, Rona Zollinger, described this lawsuit as “corporations trying to get away with [negative] environmental impact. I think that as consumers in the United States, we don’t really understand the impacts of our waste and I think corporations try to hide the impacts.” She also said “No matter what the exact numbers are, we have to change the way we consume. The exact numbers of bags that everyone uses is not the point; the point is that we are creating waste that is going to be in the earth for thousands of years. (Zollinger)”

            As for myself, I believe reusable bags, like ChicoBags, are more convenient than plastic bags and always have one attached to my belt whenever I go out. This lawsuit being filed by the plastic bag manufacturers seems excessive and ignores the truth of the negative impacts their products have on our planet. I, along with my school, support ChicoBags and we will continue to sell them at Farmer’s Market so that we are able to reduce plastic bag pollution by turning to a smarter alternative.

(Martinez Gazette article : http://www.martinezgazette.com/news/story/i2724/2011/06/09/battle-ensues...)

Works Cited

Mart, Greta. "Battle Ensues: Bag Monster v. Big Plastic." Martinez New Gazette [Martinez] 10 June 2011. Print.