Whenever I can I use my reusable grocery bags, but even when you do that, you still end up with plastic grocery bags now and then. But I just hate to toss them in the trash — it seems so wasteful! And since I’m not one to let things just sit around and collect dust (or take up my valuable storage space), I recently decided it was high time I figured out how to use them.
In case you’re in a similar situation of sitting on a pile of empty grocery bags, I thought I’d share the uses I came across during my search with you today. These tips represent all sorts of ways you can put your stash of plastic bags to good use.
Bonus Tip: Wash Your Plastic Bags
- Regardless of how exactly you plan to reuse your plastic grocery bags, it’s not a bad idea to wash them first. It’s quick and easy to do, and it’s bound to give you some peace of mind that your bags aren’t covered in dirt or bacteria.
- To wash your grocery bags, submerge them in a sink full of hot, soapy water.
- Swish the bags around with your hands and allow them to soak there for a few minutes.
- When you’re ready to rinse, drain the sink and then rinse each bag with clean water.
- Hang the bags upside down and allow them to air dry completely before using.
Note: If you have any bags that are particularly grimy or have held raw meat, you’re better off tossing them out of an abundance of caution. Better safe than sorry!
13 Practical Ways to Reuse Plastic Bags
1. Keep Your Hands Clean
Pull a plastic bag over each hand to use them as a pair of makeshift gloves! It’s a great way to keep your hands clean when handling messy foods, or when cleaning up messes like vomit, sticky crafts, etc.
2. Clean Your Shower Head
Use a plastic bag and some distilled white vinegar to clean your shower head! Fill the bag with vinegar and use a rubber band to secure it around your shower head. Let it soak for an hour or so to allow the vinegar to dissolve mineral deposits and cut through soap scum.
Related: 8 of the Best Ways to Use White Vinegar to Clean Your Bathroom
3. Cover Your Plunger
Don’t have a stand or cover for your toilet plunger? Cover the rubber end with a plastic bag to contain germs and grime!
4. Line a Wastebasket
Grocery store bags are just the right size to use as liners in small wastebaskets. Put a few extra bags in the bottom of the empty wastebasket before lining it with another bag, and that way you’ll have a replacement ready to go the next time you empty it!
5. Keep the Shape of Purses & Shoes
Before you put shoes or handbags into storage, stuff a few plastic bags inside them. The bags will help your shoes or purses retain their shape while they’re in storage so they don’t wind up misshapen or lumpy.
6. Contain Trash in the Car
Tie an empty grocery sack to the back of your headrest on long car rides or road trips. It’s the perfect makeshift trash can for empty wrappers and drink bottles, since you can throw the whole thing away at the next rest stop!
7. Use as “Barf Bags” for Carsick Passengers
Some people may feel a little nauseous in the car, while others may get truly carsick! Prepare for the worst by keeping a few empty plastic bags in your car. That way, you’ll always have a “barf bag” handy should you ever find yourself with a vomiting passenger.
8. Keep Mirrors & Wipers Ice-Free
For those who park their cars on the street or in uncovered spots, it’s all too common to wake up to frozen side mirrors and windshield wipers during the winter. So when the forecast calls for overnight snow, cover your wipers and side mirrors with plastic bags. The bags will keep them free of ice and snow and make the next morning’s commute a little easier!
9. Cover Muddy Shoes
To avoid tracking mud or slush into your car when the weather’s bad, keep a stash of plastic bags in the car. Slip one bag over each shoe before stepping into the car to keep your floor mats clean!
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10. Wrap Plant & Plant Starts
With as much plant shopping as I did this past summer, I know just how much dirt winds up in your trunk after unloading a good plant haul! So that’s why I’ve started keeping a stash of plastic bags in my car, so I can wrap the bottoms of any plants and plant starts to keep dirt out of my car. :-)
11. Wrap Shoes in Luggage
When packing for a trip, wrap each pair of shoes you’re bringing in a grocery bag before putting them in your suitcase. The bag will prevent dirty soles from messing up your clean clothes, AND prevent your other items from scuffing up your shoes.
12. Pick Up After Your Dog
One great way to reuse plastic bags is to pick up after your dog on walks. (Just make sure to toss it into a trash can afterward, since they aren’t biodegradable—and it’s just good manners!)
13. Prevent Painting Tools From Drying
Working on a painting project? Wrap a plastic bag tightly around your brushes or paint rollers and wrap a rubber band around the bottom to secure it. This will keep the paint wet for as long as a full day so you can pick up right where you left off tomorrow.
What’s your favorite way to reuse plastic bags?
The one thing I would avoid is putting a plunger in a plastic bag. That would maintain moisture and darkness, both of which germs love. Light and air are our friends when it comes to germs.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.When you put a wet paint brush in your plastic bag then store in the refrigerator. It will be ready to start painting again long after just one day.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.I use white, or as light in color as possible, plastic grocery sacks to make a mini greenhouse. When taking cuttings, I secure the bag over the top of the pot and the cuttings. Watering the soil well before inserting the cuttings will ensure that you don’t have to monitor for moisture for several weeks. The same technique works for starting seeds too.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.Anything but clear would block the light. Or is it simply that you’re looking to contain moisture?
Please log in or create a free account to comment.living in france and holland we don’t get plastic bags any more. so I’m very mean with the ones I’ve still got.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.the plastic of the toilet rolls I always cut right in the middle of the package so I’ve got two bags again
Use white plastic bags to make a stunning Christmas wreath! It’s easy and truly beautiful. Cut strips from white plastic bags. Tie strips to wreath form, pushing them together tightly — you want a full wreath. Trim with scissors when finished to make the ends of the strips all the same length. Hot glue added decorations onto the wreath. Non-traditional colored bulbs, like pink or purple, make a lovely wreath you’ll be complimented on and that will make you smile every time you see it.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.The comment about folding the plastic bags reminds me of when visiting my moms sister they fold their plastic bags up very neatly like Landon described. I know that plastic isn’t the best for our environment. But please don’t go ballistic and lecture those of like me in retail. I’ve had people go berserk if we even try to use 1-2 bags.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.Why not just ask the customers what they want? They don’t want you giving them something – isn’t that their choice?
Please log in or create a free account to comment.A rice cooker for porridge,oatmeal? I use a microwave bowl with a lid.just 3minutes and it’s done! And as the bowls are pretty i also save on the washing up if I am only making 1 portion eat straight from the bowl
Please log in or create a free account to comment.When gardening, I watch out for small sprouts of poison ivy, which usually fit into grocery bags.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.My mom uses them to fluff out bubble curtains. I take most of mine to a man who weaves them into mats for the homeless.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.I take a large fabric bag and fill with reusable plastic (or fabric) bags and hang it (with one handle) over the driver’s headrest facing the backseat. Easy reach for use and easily seen………….
Please log in or create a free account to comment.At my work we have let people bring their own bags in. However- with the Pandemic the customers have to bag their groceries themselves if they want to use the bags. Some of the cloth ones are so
Please log in or create a free account to comment.smelly and filthy. It helps protect us from getting the virus.
Even better, just don’t get them… I have my groceries put back in my cart at checkout, and I bag them myself into my reuseable bags at my car.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.They are recyclable at grocery stores. See https://how2recycle.info/sdo and enter your ZIP code to find the nearest one to you. Also recyclable are several other plastic wraps, including ziplocs, that surprised me. These are things that cannot go in our trash recycling bins. I’m surprised at how much I used to throw in the landfill. But I’m glad we have an alternative and can be part of the solution instead of part of the problem.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.My mother in law lives with us. She has dementia, so she can’t remember where things are if they’re in a cabinet. I keep her Depends and a pack of wipes in a basket on the counter & I have an old Clorox wipes container in the basket too. I covered the wipes container with pretty scrapbook paper and a Trash Bags label, then covered that with clear contact paper so she can’t pull it off, or smear it with wet hands. If you google pop up grocery bags you’ll see how to fold and roll those grocery bags to fit the container. I roll mine from the opposite end from how they show so that I’m rolling from the bottom of the bag and pushing the air out as I go. I bet I can get 40 or more bags in that container by doing that. When new bags come in the house I just take the lid off, pull the roll out and add the new ones to it.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.Use plarn and knitting or crocheting sleeping mats for in a tent or for the homeless. Plarn, plastic bags cut in strips to use as yarn.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.For me, putting bags over shoes makes slipping boots over the shoes easier and also keeps foot dryer and warmer.
Judith, I’ve also been doing this for years. A plarn tote is perfect for the beach as the sand falls out. Also, taking cold/frozen foods home as it dries out quickly when I hang it over the shower head.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.One of the many ways I reuse plastic shopping bags is when making cuttings on the tall upright varieties of Sedums or Hylotelephium. In the spring, when the plants reach about 12 inches tall, I cut them back by half. This also keeps the sedum from becoming leggy and flopping over later in the season. Fill 6 inch recycled plastic garden pots with potting soil, moisten, then place your cuttings in the soil. Add enough cuttings that the pot so that you have a nice full plant. Place a light colored or clear plastic shopping bag over your cuttings and pot. Secure the bag so it doesn’t blow away and place in a shady, sheltered area for a couple of weeks. I dip the cuttings in rooting hormone to speed up the process. When you tug on a stem and it resists, your cuttings have rooted. At this time, I remove the plastic bag and move my new plant to a sunnier location. Wait a few more weeks and your pot will be ready to transplant into the ground.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.Some stores in my area have bins where you can bring them to recycle. We keep some under the kitchen and bathroom sinks for disposing of gross or messy stuff. I’ve seen the rugs or bags made from old bags before. I’m not someone who can crochet or whatever to make these.
Please log in or create a free account to comment.Lots of great ideas here as usual, but a few additional notes I’d like to contribute:
1. Re: “Unfortunately, I know I won’t always remember to bring (fabric shopping bags) with me.”
This is something my sister used to always say too. My advice to you Jillee is the same I gave to her: Always keeps lots of extra reusable fabric shopping bags in the trunk of your car. Then you’ll always have them on hand when going grocery shopping. When you get home and unpack your groceries, immediately hang the empty fabric bags on your door handle… (the same door you exit through whenever you leave the house). That way you’ll see it on your way out & will always remember to take them with you to throw into the trunk of your car again. It doesn’t take too long before it turns into habit, and no longer becomes a chore to remember!
2. Re: “Pour excess cooking oil and grease (after it’s cooled down) into a plastic bag before throwing it in the trash.”
Many municipalities actually ban throwing cooking oil or grease into the trash! Better idea yet: Find out if someone in your city/municipality collects used cooking oil & grease to use as bio-fuel. Some will even come collect it from you for free (after you have a certain amount accumulated)… or others will have nearby drop-off sites. They often make money after collecting LARGE amounts of used cooking oil, which they then sell to businesses who turn the used oil into bio-fuel… (which is why they’ll often collect for free or provide an easy drop-off site). Try googling for such places/services near you… or in the case of my city, I was able to find one nearby by searching in my local Craigslist using a search term along the lines of “used cooking oil” or “bio-fuel”.
I go through large amounts of cooking oil when using my deep fryer (admittedly something I don’t do as often these days)… so not only would I purchase cooking oil in large Costco-sized containers (1 gallon or larger), I use those same containers (when emptied) to store the used oil until I have enough for pick-up or drop off. For those who don’t like the idea of keeping used cooking oil around to accumulate, simply store out of the way in a place like the garage or tool shed until you’ve amassed enough for pick-up/drop-off!
3. Re: “Reuse baggies to create starter pots for plants. Just poke a few holes in the bottoms of the bags, fill with soil and plant your seeds.”
To each their own, but personally, I discourage this method of seed-starting. Any manipulation of young seedlings that will disturb the delicate, young roots in any way (when it comes time later to transplant them into the garden or a container) can be very traumatic for the seedlings, and even permanently stunt their growth! Better to make little starter pots from newspaper… (the less ink –especially colored– the better!) Instructions to make such pots can be easily found online by Googling along the lines of “newspaper starter pots”.
Then they can be transplanted without any need for removal from the newspaper pots, since the paper will degrade naturally in the soil, and any paper that hasn’t yet broken down will easily rip when wet, so that the roots can continue their growth into the new, surrounding soil without becoming root-bound or inhibited, as can often tend to happen even with other commercially-available starter pots such as peat pots (Jiffy) or others like coco coir… (although coco coir is great in the garden, in general!)
And lastly, for those who own a Foodsaver or other vacuum-sealing device:
4. Re: “Put ice in a plastic bag in your cooler. That way the water stays inside the bag when it starts to melt!”
The following is one of my favourite ways to pack extra ice in the cooler for camping (or other such excursions): Make “DIY ice packs” by freezing clean, filtered drinking water in ice cube trays, then vacuum seal the cubes in the plastic bags/rolls that are made to be used with your vacuum sealer… (the plastic you use should be food-grade for this purpose).
Then, not only will the ice/water be contained in leak-proof bags when they begin to melt, but when the ice packs have completely melted (but hopefully caught before they’ve started to warm up!) simply snip off a corner from the plastic bags to serve ice-cold, clean, drinking water straight from the bags!
On hot days when camping or when no other sources of cold water are present, you wouldn’t believe what a welcome treat this can be! Others will marvel at your method of transporting ice, and if not privy to the gems of your efforts, will also be VERY envious! Far better to have clean cold drinking water, than a cooler full of melted, dirty water for your food to eventually drown & go soggy in!
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