• Offer reusable bag options such as PPE, calico and paper bags for sale to customers.
  Reusable bag contacts are available from Planet Ark. Click here for details of reusable bag options, prices and ordering details.
• Train staff to ask customers "do you need a bag?" with their purchase.
• Educate staff to promote reusable bag options to all customers by saying, "would you like to buy a reusable bag?"
• Put plastic bag reduction posters and reusable bags near check-out tills. Pictures of animals caught up in plastic bags are a very effective way to get people to use reusable bags instead of plastic.
• Create local PR. Instead of giving away a free plastic bag - charge 10 cents per plastic check-out bag and give the proceeds to local charities. Many stores have done this - Bunnings, for example, charge 10 cents per plastic check-out bag.
• Ban plastic check-out bags altogether! Replace them with paper and reusable bags. Whole towns such as Coles Bay, Kangaroo Valley, Huskisson and Oyster Bay in NSW and Birregurra, Cannon's Creek, Murtoa and Metung in Victoria are already plastic bag free communities.

• You stand to save on the cost of plastic bags. The retail industry currently spends $173 million a year giving away 'free' plastic bags at a cost to their businesses. These savings can be passed on to your customers, which can only result in you becoming more competitive.
• You get to sell reusable bags on which you can make money.
• You can create some great local PR by contacting your local newspaper and radio station to let them know that you are taking action to reduce the billions of plastic check-out bags used by Australians every year.
• You will help to reduce the numbers of wildlife that are injured or killed by plastic bags every year.
• As a retailer you are now required to reduce your plastic check-out bag usage. This is based on an agreement between the Federal Government and the Australian Retailer Association (ARA). You can be at the forefront of this change.

Click here for more retailers information, including what some national retailers are already doing to reduce their plastic check-out bag usage.