As plastic bag ban nears, some in Easton are already ahead of the curve

Easton, Md. – Plastic bags are soon to be a thing of the past, in Easton following a new ordinance.

“We saved probably about 250,000 plastic bags,” says Ryan Groll, owner of Sprout.

Ordinance 784, a plastic bag ban is set to take place in April. “Retail establishments in Easton will no longer be able to provide single use plastic bags to customers, they do have the option, as a transitional piece to offer paper bags for a charge of 10 cents per paper bag,” says Greg Mueller, the PR Specialist for the Town of Easton.

Greg Mueller says micro plastics have been a big issue in local waterways. Whichever approach the business decides to take with this new effort, the town will be able to cut down on waste and help save the environment. “The plastic bag ban was put in place to help keep Easton clean, so we want to keep our waterways, our streets and our recreational areas free of plastics and to help the environment,” says Mueller.

One local business in Easton, Sprout has been using reusable bags since 2016 and they’ve had a great turnout. “It’s been great…and then we started using reusable smaller and larger bags since we opened this location in 2018 and obviously purchase those between two and three dollars for these bags,” says Ryan Groll.

Since 2016, now with three locations, Sprout business owner, Ryan Groll says it all started with coolers. “We would put individual meals in the coolers and give the cooler to a customer and they would bring the cooler bag when they were done using it so we cycled through these coolers and we just added to our fleet of coolers,” says Groll.

Now the business uses reusable bags, and to make the plastic bag ban more efficient, Groll suggests the town switch to a trade policy. “Why not do a bring a bag, take a bag concept where if you just happen to have all these plastic bags, one bag with all the bags inside the other and just take that to a company you support and then you want them to then use it,” he adds.

Greg Mueller on behalf of the town says they recognize how this ban will disproportionately impact low income families. However, the town is raising money to purchase and provide free reusable bags for low income families. You can donate to the effort on their website.

The new ordinance will take affect April 2nd.