About the Program

The City of Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara Channelkeeper, Choose to Reuse, and the California Grocers Association have joined together to create the Where’s Your Bag? campaign. The goal of the campaign is to educate the public about the negative environmental effects of plastic and paper single-use bags, and to promote the use of reusable shopping bags. This campaign is part of a community-wide effort to provide a solutions-based approach to this important environmental issue.

The average person uses over 500 bags per year and we’d like to see that number reduced dramatically. Plastic bags are causing huge problems in our oceans: animals like sea turtles die when they mistake them for food, and the plastic breaks down into small bits that end up in the fish we eat. Paper bag production is extremely energy intensive - far more so than plastic bags. Only a small percentage of each type of bag is recycled. Where’s Your Bag? aims to educate the general public about the problems associated with single use bags and an easy way to deal with some of these problems; by bringing a reusable bags whenever someone shops!

Grocery Stores

Sign Up Your Store
Stores can support the use of reusable bags simply by encouraging customers to bring their own bags. This is strictly an educational program, and stores do not have change business practices or curtail the distribution of paper and plastic bags. The campaign will provide educational materials to the store free of charge to remind customers to bring back their bags, presentations for store employees (upon request), and recognition of the store's green business practices in reducing litter and marine pollution by being listed on this website.

In-Store Educational Campaign
We all have reusable bags, but do we remember to bring them and use them each and every time we shop? The Where’s Your Bag? campaign attempts to address this issue through a coordinated effort to educate grocery store staff, customers and the general public through staff training, advertising, signage, special events, and media releases. We will provide educational materials to stores that remind customers to bring and use their reusable bags. Those materials will include parking lot signs, in-store posters with the Where’s Your Bag? message, information cards for customers, buttons for employees to wear, and windshield decals for baggers to give to customers as a gentle and practical reminder for the next shopping trip.

These educational resources will be provided to participating stores:

• buttons for staff
• Informational cards for customers
• In-store posters
• Customer windshield reminder decals

Campaign Presentation for Store Employees
Brief, engaging, and interactive presentations are provided by the Where's Your Bag? partnership for store management and staff at your place of business. Posters and other educational materials will be provided at the presentation.

Recognition and Promotion of Participating Stores
Lists of participating stores will be displayed on this website and on printed advertising for the Where's Your Bag? campaign.

Case Study: Tri-County Produce

Tri-County Produce has taken a leadership role in the move from paper and plastic to reusable bags and is a strong supporter of the Where’s Your Bag? campaign. Owner John Dixon has implemented and tested several methods for promoting the use of reusable bags and assisted the partnership to develop in-store practices that work. In order to measure their success rate, Tri-County Produce has begun collecting data regarding the number of people that bring reusable bags when they shop. To do this, they have programmed a key on their register to track customers bringing in their own reusable bags. In addition, baggers have been trained to ask customers if they brought a reusable bag or if they need a bag (especially for the purchase of one item) and a free reusable bag is given with a minimum purchase. Tri-County Produce has also added the Where’s Your Bag? logo to their reusable, paper, and plastic bags to remind customers to bring their own reusable bags.

In addition to the steps outlined above, Tri-County Produce has implemented a program to not only promote the use of reusable bags, but also to support local non-profit organizations. A donation of .05 cents is made every time a customer brings AND uses their own reusable bag. How it Works: When customers use their own bag(s) they are handed a raffle ticket for each reusable bag they use (limit 5 bags per customer). The customer can then put the raffle ticket in a container representing the non-profit of their choice. Tri-County Produce will select up to four different charities (such as Foodbank of SB, Boys & Girls Club, Girls Inc. PAL, Transition House, CALM, etc.) per quarter for customers to choose between. At the end of each quarter, raffle tickets will be added up and a donation will be made to the respective organizations. Tri-County Produce sees this as a win-win program for both them and the community at large. The message of Reuse/Reduce is sent, Tri-County Produce spends less on single-use bags, and local non-profits benefit from donations!

Tri-County is available to speak with local store managers about implementing the campaign or specialized programs such as the non-profit donation program. For more information on how Tri-County Produce is promoting the reduction of single-use bags, please contact John Dixon at 805-965-4558 or via email him atjohn@tcpsb.com.

Sign Up
For general campaign questions, or to sign up, please call or email:

Kathi King
Where’s Your Bag? Campaign
(805) 689-2075
kathibking@cox.net

Participating Stores

The following stores are encouraging and reminding customers to bring their reusable bags as part of this campaign:

Albertsons
Lazy Acres
Scolari's
Tri-County Produce

Reusable Bag Sponsor
Your sponsorship will help provide the public with free reusable bags handed out at tabling or special events and door-to-door neighborhood projects. As part of the door-to-door neighborhood project, volunteers work in designated areas to disseminate door hangers telling people about the Where’s Your Bag? campaign and notifying residents that they will be back the following week to exchange a free bag courtesy of the bag sponsor for a paper or plastic bag. Donated bags are tagged with a Where’s Your Bag? information card linking the donated bag with the program. Please see the Volunteers section to read more about one of our recent volunteer neighborhood projects. An In-kind donation is $250 worth of reusable bags.

Sponsorship checks can be made out to the City of Santa Barbara. Funds received will only be used for the Where’s Your Bag? campaign and are tax deductible.

If you are interested in a sponsorship package or need more information about sponsorship, please call Kathi King at (805) 689-2075 or kathibking@gmail.com