The cost of kitchen garbage bags....

**The Transporter** · 02-09-2010, 12:18 PM

I tickled to see that this thread of trash bags hasn't been thrown out! hee hee

But, in all honesty, it is the little things that do add up!! I drive my children crazy at the grocery store, I will sit and do the math on just about everything, and go with the one that costs the less per oz, per use, per whatever. LOL

My oldest dd ( 22 and married) finally came to my side of the fence when I pointed out to her that buying Scott Soft was acutally cheaper than buying Angel Soft TP....and it's a better product ( I hate hard tp!) Scott is even cheaper the Wal Mart verison of Charmin. This is once case where buying name brand actually was cheaper then buying store brand.

It's nice to see what everyone else chooses to do with something as simple as buying trash bags.

**RetiredVeryEarly** · 03-27-2010, 03:09 AM

A few thoughts on this topic from someone who hasn't bought a trash bag in at least 15 years. I use cloth bags for shopping, but some friends who don't save their plastic ones for me. If your house garbage cans are way too big for those bags, then get smaller garbage cans! Easy enough to get free on freecycle, in fact I have several small ones I could give away myself, we sort of collect things from lots of people. :-) My brother put hardwood mulch around his previous house, he saved the bags and I have those for when I need a large plastic bag.

Recycle everything you can, obviously. If you live in an area where you fear rats in your compost, you can just dig a hole in your garden and dump the stuff in every few days and cover it with dirt. That is what several of my relatives do. We live in the country and have several compost piles, no problem. Worm bins in the house work well for some of my city friends. As for not being able to put leaves in your yard because a garden is going there, hey, put the leaves on the garden soil! They will rot and make nice humus.

The person who said 180 bags was at least half a year's supply, well, that person scares me! At our previous home where there was trash pickup, we put out trash so infrequently (about 2 or 3 times per year) that the mayor once told my hubby that people would think we throw our trash in the ditch someplace if we didn't put out more.

**savvy_sniper** · 03-27-2010, 09:58 AM

Starting April 1, the City of Houston will require that any yard waste be put curbside in CITY APPROVED compostable bags. You have to buy these bags and they are specifically marked. The city is encouraging people to compost and/or leave their grass clipping on the lawn.

**krbshappy71** · 03-27-2010, 12:20 PM

I switched to smaller "bedside" trash cans a couple weeks ago for my main kitchen garbage can thanks to reading this thread. I had a few cans around the house, just didn't think to use them in the kitchen. It is only my daughter and I in the household so we have very little trash anyhow, I don't know why I was so bent on having a large kitchen can and larger kitchen garbage bags, habit no doubt. Lack of awareness to change it. Now that we've switched, I like that I have smaller, easier to carry little sacks in the kitchen and it definitely keeps down the smell. I am using the grocery sacks that piled up in the garage, I do use cloth sacks for groceries but sometimes I buy too much and end up with grocery sacks. Other times I forget to return the sacks to my car and then stop off at the store. All habits I'll try to be aware of.

I really love this site! Everyone tries so hard to find out what else they can be doing for frugality and the health of the planet, it is such an inspiration.

**rudypoo98** · 04-02-2010, 03:03 PM

I have two dogs I take care of,Boxer is mine and a Rot Lab mix that is my daughters.I save all the dog food bags and use them for all my paper trash since we have a new trash pickup and they don't recycle.Since I started doing this I only use one 13 gallon kitchen bag every 3-4 weeks.At this rate 55 Glad Flex Force bags are going to last me how many years? The dogs eat all my scraps which I don't have many.I compost peelings and things like that so I don't have to worry about the trash stinking.

**mndtrp** · 04-27-2010, 10:15 PM

In our household, there is only the fiancee and I, plus a cat. We recycle as much as we can, and compost everything that was once alive. That includes meat and dairy, since I cover everything up with leaves and don't put the compost on my garden.

About half of our trash cans have grocery bags as liners, but I don't dump the liner out with the trash each week. I'll go through those trash cans, and sort out the recyclables, compostables, and straight up trash. The actual trash goes in the kitchen trash can, which is rarely more than half full. We could go a couple of weeks without taking the trash out to the curb, but the kitchen trash usually has some sort of meat packaging that gets stinky. The cat litter is put into a plastic jar that has a locking lid, and then dumped into the main trash bag right before putting on the curb.

Leaves/grass/yard waste either gets composted, or just gets mowed into the lawn with a mulching blade. When Fall came around last year, I loaded up the back of my pickup with everyone's bagged leaves, which I then composted or mowed into my lawn. The bags are now reserved for when I have to line my garage trash can.

All that boils down to us needing one trash bag a week. We could go a little longer, but some things start to stink.