What does it take to get plastic out of your life? Unless you can go back in time 100 years, it is pretty much impossible. But what about some plastic? Just a place to start?
In this episode, we are talking about plastic waste in the grocery store and how to try to take control of the plastics that wind up in your shopping cart.
Amy Barrilleaux
Brendon Smith, Marketing and Communications Director, Willy St. Co-op
Resources for you
People are also reading…
Transcript
Amy Hi there and welcome to The Defender, Wisconsin’s environmental podcast. I’m Amy Barrilleaux. The Defender is powered by Clean Wisconsin, your environmental voice since 1970. What does it take to get plastic out of your life? Well, unless you can go back in time a hundred years, it’s pretty much impossible. But what about some plastic, just a place to start? I have some good news. It’s Plastic Free July and there is a place to start. The challenge? Go a month without single-use plastics. And most of those kinds of plastics come with your food. In this episode, we’re talking about plastic waste in the grocery store and how to try to take control of the plastics that wind up in your shopping cart. That’s right now on The Defender. I don’t want to be too depressing, but plastic is everywhere, even when you don’t see it. It’s in the water we drink, the food we eat, and the air we breathe. Micro and nano plastics have been found throughout the human body, and concentrations in human tissues increased by 50% between 2015 and 2024. So it’s going to take an army of us to push back on this tidal wave of plastic, and that can feel overwhelming. But maybe the first place to start is with your food, and some local grocery stores are trying to help. Joining me is Brendon Smith, Marketing and Communications Director with the Willy Street Co-op, one of the largest food co-ops in Wisconsin, which has been promoting Plastic Free July. Brendon, thank you so much for being here, and I guess, how did the idea to start promoting this come about?
Brendon Sure. Well, first, thanks for having me. I would say that sustainability is a big part of what the co-op does every month. And we had heard about a Plastic Free July trend, and we thought that was a great time for us to be focusing on the ways we try to avoid plastic in our stores and make it easier for our customers to avoid plastic as well.
Amy So when I think about Plastic Free July, I guess it’s kind of a challenge to go a month without single-use plastics. But then I looked at my refrigerator, and I was kind of like, what is a single-use plastic? You know, I’m looking at the hummus in plastic, and if I eat that in a couple days, is that kind of single-use? So how are you defining, I guess, this notion of single-use plastics?
Brendon Sure. I would say planning to use the plastic once, the container, the utensils, whatever it is, straws once and discard it. Now, if you get food in a plastic container and then reuse it for seedlings, for example, or for other uses, it’s not single use anymore. You’re finding another use for it and you’re extending its life and you are preventing multiple single-use plastic uses. So that’s great. Every little bit helps.
Amy So, you work for a grocery store, and as hard as Willy Street Co-op might try to reduce plastic, it feels like there’s more and more plastic. Not in Willy Street Co-op specifically, but just when you walk down the aisle of a grocery store, the things that are not in plastic are way outweighed by the things that are in plastic. So, as part of the grocery industry, do you see that? Do you see the trends are not exactly going in the right direction? Or maybe we’ve turned a corner and now they are going in the wrong direction.
Brendon I think it’s in some ways both. We’ve seen things like some produce plastic containers that are using less plastic or no plastic in some cases. There are kind of cardboard berry containers and they can be a little bit more expensive and they tend to sell out very quickly because people want to support that, at least in our stores. And I know some vendors are trying to move toward glass where possible, or glass jars instead of plastic containers. So there are some areas I think that are moving away from plastic, but plastic does a lot of very helpful things. It can be clear, glass can too, but paper, not so clear. So I think it’s a struggle, but I think there is clearly interest from people who are shopping in the stores to avoid it when possible. And it’s not always possible. And I think more and more companies are trying to figure out ways they can do it. They can sell their products without plastic if possible. And like I said, in some cases it just may not be possible.
Amy And the thing that the co-op is doing, which I think is kind of a big deal is you are trying not to use on your hot bar, you know, your takeaway food, the plastic or disposable silverware. I call it silverware but it’s made out of plastic. It’s plasticware, I guess. You’re trying to transition to this sort of take and bring back program. Tell me how that’s going to work.
Brendon Sure. Well, for years we had offered compostable cutlery when people would take it to go. The problem is a lot of compost facilities don’t have high enough heat to be able to compost that cutlery. So even though we had good intentions that cutlery was really just going into the landfill like regular plastic cutlery. And when COVID hit, we used to have bowls and cups and plates and silverware in our stores. And we stopped that early in COVID when it seemed like COVID might be transmitted by touch. And then it took us a while to come back to that. And so we had seen, I think there are at least eight other food co-ops around the country who are doing this bring it back concept where people can take stainless steel cutlery home with them and then bring it back. We’ll wash it, sanitize it and put it back out. And if some ends up in their silverware drawer, that’s okay. We think it will still be cost effective in the long run. It’s really zero waste. And from the eight co-ops that have been doing this so far, they’ve saved over one million pieces of cutlery from the landfill.
Amy Wow, that is great. I mean, does the co-op go through the stores and think, okay, where are the places where we can kind of make a shift or make a change and then bring it out and hope that it works? Is that kind of what you’re trying to do?
Brendon Yeah, I think we’re always kind of interested in ways we can improve. And then two years ago, we had a plastic audit. We looked at everywhere in the stores we use plastic, from plastic wrap on pallets when they come in into the receiving area to things like cutlery, to products on the shelves, wrap for sandwiches, plastic clamshells for deli products. And we found that there weren’t a lot of materials out there that would make it easy for us to switch yet. Even setting aside cost, a lot of the options we found weren’t as durable as plastic, unfortunately, but there’s a lot of interest in it and it seems like every few months we’ll see a new thing being tried. And so we’re keeping a close eye on that. I expect we’ll do another audit in the next year or two and see where we can make improvements. And I’d say any customers who also share this concern, please feel free to contact your favorite brands and say, would you consider packing your product in glass instead of plastic? It can be more expensive because not only is the material a factor, weight is a factor and glass is definitely heavier than plastic, but if enough people who purchase the product request it, I think the brands will have to look at that option and consider making some changes too.
Amy And I think if people are worried about their health in plastic and microplastics and nanoplastics, maybe they can start with the places where exposure is more likely, like tea bags, because when you heat up a tea bag and steep it, and if there’s plastic in there, then that’ll get into your body, or honey, because it sits in that plastic container for so long. If you have everything in your cabinet in plastic, you can at least prioritize a little bit, like, okay. Maybe tea, maybe honey, maybe I can reach those folks. Did you feel like after COVID, because you mentioned that you went from bowls and plates and silverware to disposable stuff during COVID, that we saw a lot more plastic? I know some grocery stores started wrapping produce in more plastic and now it seems to have stayed. Is that what you’re seeing in the grocery world?
Brendon Yeah, I think it took us a lot longer. Even once COVID moved on, I think a lot of the habits stayed and we’re starting to see that kind of break up. It has just taken a while for people to make changes back to the way things used to be. And I think some things won’t be going back that way. Packaging really changed. For a while, we needed to shut down our hot bar and our bulk bins. We have about 500 products in bulk where people can get as much or as little as they want. People can bring in sanitized containers, their own sanitized container, and fill them that way. And we had to shut that down because you have to either use a scoop or pull the bin handle if it’s a gravity bin. And again, when we thought it was transmitted by touch, we couldn’t have a bunch of people touching these surfaces over and over. So we saw it take a while for bulk purchases to pick back up and people to get back into that habit. So I do think it had some long-term disruption for people’s habits and we’re still seeing some of that coming back.
Amy So it’s kind of a challenge, right? July, Plastic Free July, don’t use any single-use plastics or try not to during this month. I saw that in the Willy Street Reader right at the beginning of July and I thought, oh, I think I need a month to prepare to get plastic out of my life. I need to start cooking and get things ready. So my Plastic Free is probably going to be August, but are you doing Plastic Free July yourself or trying to?
Brendon I’m not quite that committed. I do try to give some extra attention to what I’m using and ways I can shift it. It does remind me a little bit of when we have an Eat Local Month. It originally started as an Eat Local challenge where we asked people to eat as much locally produced food as possible during that month. And I had people saying, what about salt? You know, salt isn’t local. What am I supposed to do? And I said, it’s not so much about being perfect. It’s about being more sensitive and considering these things. I think even if you can make one change this month, that’s an improvement. I also see it kind of like being a New Year’s resolution. I’m going to eat better. Oh, no, I cheated and it’s all ruined. No, it’s not. Little changes can make a huge impact. So if you can just swap out one thing this month or a couple things and then do that each July, that is an improvement. I really hope people don’t get too hung up on the perfection part of it or, oh, I messed up and I really had to do this. That’s fine. Any change is an improvement.
Amy And then, like you said, maybe this is a good month to think about what product you would like to see not in plastic anymore or packaged differently so that it’s more sustainable. It is not just on you to change the world. The places you buy from can help with that.
Brendon That’s right. I think also spending money with coffee shops and grocery stores and other places that pay attention to this kind of stuff sends the message that you value their work in this area. Letting stores and organizations know that you are paying attention to this and that they should consider it will help them to make different decisions in the future.
Amy Now, I do have one plastic-free idea that I want to pitch since you’re here. So long ago, my very first job in high school was working at a grocery store. At that time, there were no labels on the produce, mostly. You had to just memorize what the produce was or look up the number on a sheet. And that was it. Then I think we transitioned at some point to maybe sometimes paper, kind of like price tag type labels where there’d be a number. But now it feels like every time I get produce and I compost an avocado or whatever, I have to peel this plastic label off of every single thing. And I’m going, is this really necessary? Why is there plastic attached to every piece of produce I have? So is that something that can easily change in your perspective back to the old school way?
Brendon I don’t think so. I don’t think easily. Those are mostly put on unless it comes from a price gun and it’s a little white slip. If it’s got graphics on it then it’s definitely from the vendor. But I know that there is work on making sure that those materials are compostable at least and designed to be compostable, not just that they will eventually break down. I know that there was one company that was working on produce stickers that I think under hot water turn into soap, which you can use to wash the produce.
Amy Whoa.
Brendon Again, I think it’s probably pretty expensive and they will need more work to figure out how to do it so that it will be widely adopted. But there are those kinds of really innovative ideas being worked on now, which I think is great.
Amy Well, if you’re ever talking to any produce vendors, just let them know I don’t think labels are necessary, but I’m not in the grocery store world anymore. Based on my expertise when I was 16, I learned a lot about the different kinds of pears because I had to memorize it and it’s now a life skill. I’m sure that it’s just hard when you can look back at the world that we had before plastics were in everything and think, why did this change happen? As a world, we’re producing more plastics, not less, every year, even though there is this big concern. I think Plastic Free July gives people that kind of moment to think about it. Are you getting feedback from customers right now on Plastic Free July, like this is great, I’m glad to do it, or now you’ve got me overwhelmed? What kind of feedback does the co-op get on this?
Brendon I haven’t heard much specifically about this, but we do consistently get requests to continue to reduce the amount of plastic we’re using now. We still do use some plastic in our deli foods for clamshell containers and clear wrap for sandwiches, and we do offer compostable plastic bags in produce. Our shoppers are really interested generally in reducing plastic and they’d like us to do even more, and we’re working on that. I think a lot of them view this as, well of course the co-op would publish this, this is exactly why I’m shopping there. They may find some of the things they see on the calendar we included in our newsletter and say, yep, do this already, already, already, but we’re hoping even a few things on there come up and they say, oh yeah, I guess I haven’t thought about that. We also posted on social media a plastic free produce guide on how you can extend the life of produce products and try to avoid plastic.
Amy Yeah, I think that’s one of the areas where the consumer has a lot of power over the plastic is in the produce aisle. You can try to store your vegetables in a different way in the crisper or wherever. You don’t need that plastic necessarily. I can’t remember the last time I’ve used a plastic produce bag.
Amy I just, sometimes my stuff gets kind of wilted and I eat it anyway. I’m doing my best. But I will say, back when the co-op first started the Eat Local September idea, that really did change my perspective. I was like, can I eat local for a month? What would that even mean? Maybe this will be the same for plastic. People start thinking, is this even possible for me? I’m going to have to, for me, make my granola bars now because that’s what I bring in plastic. Maybe I can make that every week and that will be a new habit.
Brendon Yeah, exactly. I think with the Eat Local Month, I heard from people who had never really realized there are certain things that we can’t grow locally or produce locally. Yes, we have local coffee roasters, but we’re not growing the coffee locally. There is a lot of produce that we kind of take for granted that we can’t grow locally as well. It was really interesting and I remember somebody coming in during the flooding about a decade ago, the flooding in the southwestern portion of Wisconsin. Somebody came in and said, I can’t believe you have melons from out of state. You should have them from in-state. We said that flooding in Wisconsin took out the local melons. I think it can help people see more how it’s all connected and these things that are happening, quote unquote, out there really can affect us locally. It’s tied together.
Amy Yeah. When we think about food and sustainability, eating local and reducing our plastic are all interrelated issues. I really appreciate your time to talk about all this. I may not make Plastic Free July, but I’m going to try for a Plastic Free August. That’s my goal.
Brendon I’m glad to hear it.
Amy All right, thank you so much, I appreciate it.
Brendon Thank you, Amy, have a good one.
Amy You too.
Amy And thank you for listening to The Defender. We’ve got all those tips for going plastic free and for how to store your produce without plastic linked in the show notes, or you can find this episode and the links at cleanwisconsin.org/podcast. And I’ve got to say, I’m already kicking myself that I forgot to mention those plastic spouts that have been added to milk cartons for some reason. I feel like those can go away too, along with those stickers on every single banana, but that’s a conversation for next time I’ve got Brendon on. If you have something you want me to talk about or comment on the show, just send me an email, podcast@cleanwisconsin.org. I’m Amy Barrilleaux, talk to you later.
