17 September 2020: Compostable plastic at Trader Joes, Royal Oak
Attached is a photo of English cucumbers at Trader Joe's, Royal Oak, wrapped in compostable material. This means the wrapping can go into the compost pile instead of the trash.
In general, plastic cannot be recycled curbside, although it can be recycled in Southeast Michigan at SOCCRA and elsewhere:
Plastic bags and film may be recycled at area retail and grocery store locations such as Kroger, Meijer, Walmart, Target and Kohl's and do not require use of SOCRRA's site for recycling. Please visit www.plasticfilmrecycling.org. Using their recycling locator, you can enter your zip code to find retail locations near you.
Acceptable items: plastic grocery bags, zip top bags, air pillows, dry cleaning bags, wrap that comes around napkins, paper towel, bathroom tissue, bread bags, produce bags, and newspaper bags.
The manufacturers of these materials understand that these materials cannot be recycled curbside, and have provided for 18,000 drop-offs nationwide to collect for recycling. Follow their lead and do not place these items in your recycling cart and use the provided drop-off locations. https://www.socrra.org/
I try to have a "no trash" household, which means I recycle or compost almost everything.
I like shopping at Trader Joe's because they pay their employees a living wage (see https://www.glassdoor.com/Hourly-Pay/Trader-Joe-s-Hourly-Pay-E5631.htm), the employees seem to be treated well, and the company appears to listen to my suggestions when I contact them online (https://www.traderjoes.com/contact-us). However, they don't actually respond so I don't know for sure. But this is my third "success" in getting them to change their policy (removing styrofoam backing for persian cucumbers, providing compostable bags to put fruits and vegetables into, replacing vegetable plastic wrappings with compostable material). I am still working on replacing the small bottles of their "bagel seasoning" with bigger containers.
The world certainly has a lot of problems. I cannot change the big ones quickly or easily. But I can work on the small ones, which have an impact, even if limited. In addition, small changes build on each other. According to the theory of self-organized criticality, enough individual grains of sand dropped on a sandpile will eventually cause an "avalanche" or a dramatic change (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organized_criticality, http://jasss.soc.surrey.ac.uk/4/4/reviews/bak). But you have to act, to drop the grains of sand. Wishing and hoping is not enough (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jr1qKuz0FMY).
As a consumer, I try to support businesses that have made making the world a better place a major part of their mission. As a business owner, I try to do that also. It cannot just be about making money.