Whereas the big supermarkets of Coles and Woolworths will ban the single use bags from June, Bernardi’s will begin their phase out from April 2, with the stores all being free of them from the beginning of May.

Bernardi’s CEO, Joe Bernardi said that the company has used up to 8 million single use plastic bags each year, and that he wants to ensure the switch is as easy as possible for customers. 

“Although we have many customers who are already bringing their own bags, we want to make this as simple as possible for everyone so we will phase out single-use plastic bags at the registers over a period of four weeks,”

“This period will end on 30th April, after which customers will be required to bring their own bags or alternatively, they can make use of other options we have at the checkouts” he says.

Some of those options include utilising free cardboard produce boxes, and reusable bags that range from 10 cents to $3.

Mr Bernardi said that the bags are all provided at less than the cost price and is only part of what the company is doing to reduce waste.

“4 out of 5 stores have solar panels that reduce our power consumption by up to 20%, stock not suitable for re-sale is donated to charity, all meat and vegetable off cuts are given to local producers to feed their animals and we have a cardboard and plastic compactor to package up and send off cardboard boxes for recycling,” he said.