Drop your soft plastics at the shops
Bread bags, chip packets, bubble wrap. Clean and dry, on your next shop.
Why This Matters
Soft plastic tangles in the sorting machinery, so a kerbside bin sends it to landfill or spoils the recycling around it. The bins at the shops are a different stream that can actually take it.
The bag of bags
Where does the soft plastic collect at your place? The bag of bags under the sink, the bread bags on the bench, or even just last night’s pasta wrapper. Nothing going yet? Today’s the day to start one.
What goes in
If you can scrunch it into a ball, it counts. Bread bags, cling wrap, pasta and rice packets, bubble wrap, produce bags, and yes, chip packets and the silver-lined snack wrappers too. The foil-looking ones are on the accepted list.
It all has to be clean, empty and completely dry, so rinse anything greasy and let it dry first. Leave out bread tags, bottle tops, straws, biscuit trays, balloons, toothpaste tubes, compostable and biodegradable bags, and anything still holding food. Unsure about something? The scheme’s own advice is to put it in the general bin, because one wrong wrapper can spoil the batch.
Most of the bins are at Woolworths, though a few other shops have them too. What gets collected comes back as wall panelling and bread bags made with 30 per cent recycled plastic.
Got used batteries around the house? Plenty of shops have a separate bin for those, so tape the ends and take them along in their own bag.
How to do this
- Find a bin near you on Recycling Near You.
- Start a bag somewhere you’ll see it filling.
- Scrunch it down and knot it when full.
- Drop it in on your next shop. Done.
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