In November 2018, Woolworths introduced low-cost reusable shopping bags into four of its Cape Town stores. The first store to stop using plastic bags completely was the Woolworths in Steenberg Village, Tokai. The retail giant has announced that it will stop selling plastic shopping bags at three more locations.
The stores will include Maroun Square in Johannesburg, Moreleta Village in Pretoria and Delcairn Centre in Durban.
From May 2019, the reusable black fabric bags will be available in 15 additional stores across the country. They cost R5 and are made from recycled plastic bottles by local South African supplier Isikhwama.
The stores to receive the reusable bags are: Constantia Village (Cape Town), Delcairn Centre (Durban), Douglasdale (Johannesburg), Durban West St (Durban), Hout Bay (Cape Town), I’langa Mall (Nelspruit), Knysna Mall (Knysna), Lilies Quarter (Durban), Maroun Square (Johannesburg), Moreleta Village (Pretoria), Nelspruit Crossings (Nelspruit), Nicolway (Bryanston), Parkview Kimiad (Pretoria), Sandton City (Sandton), and Waterstone (Somerset West).
According to Business Insider, over 110,000 of these bags have been sold in the Cape Town stores and 130,000 plastic bottles were recycled to make the bags. In order to make one metre of material, which is enough fabric for two bags, just 1.6 bottles are needed.
Feroz Koor, the Woolworths Holdings Group Head of Sustainability, told Business Insider, ‘At the stores where customers had the option to keep buying single-use plastic bags, we saw promising reductions in plastic bag sales, particularly at Woolies Pinelands, Cape Town, where there was a 23% drop in the sales of single-use plastic bags.’
In June 2018, Woolworths announced in a statement its commitment for all its packaging to be either reusable or recyclable by 2022. The retailer has also committed to phasing out single-use plastic shopping bags completely by 2020.
The Cape Town Woolworths stores selling low-cost reusable bag since November 2018 are Steenberg Village, V&A Waterfront, Palmyra Junction and Pinelands.
Image source: Woolworths.co.za
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