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The Changing Landscape of Plastic Bags

As of Aug. 1, shoppers buying their groceries at the area’s two largest grocery chains, Big Y Foods and Stop & Shop, and at the town’s homegrown market, Bishop’s Orchards, stopped receiving single-use plastic bags provided at checkouts. The stores have undertaken a variety of strategies to ease that sting.

Statewide, Connecticut’s new single bag tax kicked in on Aug. 1. The new tax, which charges retail customers 10 cents per each single-use plastic bag and paper bag given at checkouts, will be revised in June 2021, after which time stores in the state will be banned from providing single use plastic bags at checkout.

In Guilford, however, the regulations are more stringent. On June 3, the Board of Selectmen adopted an ordinance that eliminates all single-use plastic bags at the point of checkout as of January 2020. The ordinance allows businesses to phase out plastic bags over a six-month period, allowing owners to work through plastic bags they may have already purchased. In addition, Guilford shoppers will pay a 10-cent fee on paper bags, with a goal of encouraging people to use reusable bags.

Local markets are responding to the changes by making it easier for shoppers to switch to reusable bags. At Bishop’s Orchard Farm Market & Winery, for instance, the store was offering a $.99 sale on its reusable bags.

The Fresh Market has not eliminated single-use bags at checkout, but is offering 25 percent off its $1.49 reusable bags through Aug. 31.

Big Y will also offer discounts on reusable bags through the month of August. Beginning Aug. 1, while supplies last, Stop & Shop has been offering a free reusable bag to all Connecticut customers who bring in single-use plastic bags to be recycled (one reusable bag per visit per customer).

Courier Senior Staff Writer Pam Johnson contributed to this story.