Those rectangular canvas bags more than likely started as freebees from bookshops, buy a heap of heavy books and a plastic bag just doesn’t cut it, later on there where adapted by supermarkets.
As to what we Americans do with the bags after we bring them home, and why we may not see Wegman’s bags in use in the stores:
After I bring food home in the bags, I pile them up by the front door. When I start to notice the stack taking over, I take them back to the car and put them in the trunk inside another bag. But I always forget to bring them from the car into the store with me, so I tell the checkers to just pile the groceries back into the cart, and I bag them as I load them into the trunk. I imagine that many other people also forget the bags in the car. It took me awhile to figure out that I don’t need to bring them in with me. I think that until we are actually charged a fee for bags, many of us will continue to forget to bring the bags back, though, or into the store. I think I did about 30 times before I figured it out.
I see people use them at my local Wegman’s, and I have some that I use from time to time. But I also have a metric ton of canvas bags, and I mostly use those.
I think you may have been misinformed about what people use in “Europe”.
I agree with this line of thinking. They are very much more practical for car trips, than for a walk or bus journey home.
As I walk to the supermarket each time, I have no use for those bags, so I’ve left them alone. Instead I have taken to using my backpack / knapsack / rucksack / whatever you call it in your corner of the planet.
It is also difficult to print a huge, visible logo on the side of a net or mesh bag. The canvas bags offer advertising space.
How would having a fresh box of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese be better than having one two weeks older?
We have a winner.
The price of the cheapo bags the stores typically sell is subsidized by the advertising on them.
As long as you acknowledge I said it first and not that sneaky Dr. Fidelius. :p:D
I think so, too. The only people around here with net bags have them hanging off the back of their kids’ stroller. Everybody else uses the plastic or cloth bags they brought with them or takes a box or just puts the groceries in their bike saddlebags.
One of our local supermarket chains started off by selling two types of reusable bags – a (pretty cheap) European-style mesh and a very durable (and relatively expensive) canvas totes. Despite the price difference, the canvas totes outsold the mesh style by far. The store dropped the mesh bags and later replaced the canvas totes with the cheaper recycled versions.
Make of that what you will.
Well, in Germany at least the kitchens are much smaller, and there simply is no space to store all the crap that we Americans cram into our kitchens.
Frex, my friend Chris actually had a small chest freezer, he had a storage area in the basement of the house his flat was in. That was very unusual. His actual kitchen on the other had was about the size of my bathroom. He tended to keep seasonings, bottles of herbs and spices. Coffee, tea, sugar, flour, oil, vinegar, soy sauce, a tube of sweet mustard, a bag of muslix, and a few mixes[broth, gravy, assorted single use packs of salad dressing mixes of a few different flavors]
In general we shopped almost every day - his refrig was one of the oversized dorm fridges, about 9 cubic feet or thereabouts. Pretty much everything was cooked from real ingredients, not a lot of american style all inclusive box mixes, or much in the way of canned stuff. If he wanted red cabbage, and didnt want to make it from scratch he picked up a jar of premade blaukraut on the way home. Fresh veggies are better, they can live on the counter and do not need refrigeration.
One thing I adored about shopping in Germany was the ability to buy a single portion of some meat [a single duck breast, chicken leg, enough burger for one burger … a single pork chop] In the US, they look at you like you are insane if you ask for a single chicken breast, or a quarter pound of burger …
Shameless plug for the best one I’ve seen:
http://www.shamelesscommerce.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=SHOPBAG
It’s NPR Car Talk’s canvas bag, with the phrase “My other reusable bag is from a GOOD NPR show.” 
Indeed.
My solution is to tell the cashiers to simply put the groceries back into the cart. No bags at all. I then use the cart to transfer the groceries to my vehicle, and once home, I use the kids’ wagon to move the groceries into my home from the car.
I ocasionally get weird looks from people who think I’m too cheap to buy reusable bags - but why should I when I really don’t need them?
I do have one reusable bag: a large insulated bag for frozen items. But in Texas this is a necessity if you want frozen items to remain frozen for more than a minute in 100+ degree heat.
I am really not at all “green”, but I use the reusable bags because I like them better: more groceries fit in each one, they are easier to carry, and they never start ripping as you are walking up to your door with 3 full bags on each arm. So not everyone carrying reusable bags is doing so pretentiously.
You are absolutely right. They are better. It’s a matter of getting people into the habit of using them. Maybe it is like seat belts (which so many people resisted at first). Once you are used to it, it is far better and you hardly notice it.
My apologies for my careless oversight. You are indeed our winner, at least in my eyes.
Yeah, but the baggers don’t know how to bag them yet. Even at Publix, where they have a bagging world championship, they put WAY too much stuff in one canvas bag, just because it has room. Sorry, I can’t carry a shelf of canned goods with one hand, even if it fits in the bag neatly and the bag is strong enough!
They are better I guess, until you buy more groceries than you can fit into your 1-2 bags, and you have to buy another one. Or you regularly fill 1 bag so that is all you bring, and suddenly you buy 2 bags worth of stuff.
At Costco, I stopped having them put my stuff into a box because they would stuff it so full I couldn’t even lift it into my car. So I bag up the contents of the cart once I get to the car.