Organic Cotton Produce Bags

If you’re at all curious how far we are currently down the rabbit hole of organic, “clean,” and chemical-free just about everything. . .well, we’re really not down the rabbit hole anymore. And no, we haven’t moved into any sort of black hole either. We’ve decided that we are really just in the Bermuda Triangle of clean living. Clearly there is no getting out of here, and honestly we couldn’t be happier.

A few months ago I got the idea that I wanted us to work on being more conscious of the amount of single-use plastic bags that we were using. And after a little observation, we realized that we weren’t using very many single-use plastics when it came to sandwich bags, or storing items at home. It was really at the grocery store and at the farmer’s market. All of those thin little bags that we were using to bring our produce home in. Those were really adding up. (Which by the way, a lot of clean and dry single-use plastic bags can be recycled locally. For more information, click here.)

Just as we have with all of these lifestyle changes, we truly want the change to make our life better. We want it to feel seamless, to feel easy and enjoyable, and to feel worth it. And as it turned out, produce bags were not something that we saw eye to eye on. Ryan felt like we shouldn’t be buying bags. He suggested that we just make the effort to use less and recycle more. And although I really did want to run out and buy some bags, we gave his idea a whirl.

But after a few weeks sans produce bags, we found that we both wanted something and needed something. So I loaded up Amazon (which seems to increasingly be the marketplace for just about anything nowadays), and I searched through what felt like hundreds of pages of reusable produce bags, I read reviews, and I researched companies to find what we felt were the best choice. And although there are plenty of options out there, this is why we chose the Organic Cotton Mart Produce Bags:

• They are reusable. Yes obvious, but also the point.
• At $16 for a set of six bags, these bags are very reasonably priced.
• You can order them in different sizes, depending on your needs.
• They are made of 100% GOTS certified organic cotton. This means no pesticides, no chemicals, and no GMOs. This also means hypoallergenic, a softer product, a product that uses less water during production, and a product that ensures that both the farmers and the workers have safer working environments.
• They are easily machine washable on the gentle setting, and then air dried.
• Stains easily wash out. We’ve already dealt with several rounds of strawberry stains, and all of them have washed out with a little bit of stain stick.
• There is a small label on each bag that lists the “tare” weight. This means that when you are checking out at your local market or grocery store, the clerk will adjust the scale so that you are not being charged for the bag itself.
• The bags feel heavy duty, but are also completely breathable.
• There is a pull closure at the top of each bag to “seal” it shut.
• It’s an easy and small way for us to help make a difference.