I first saw these trolley bags last year, and I thought they looked great. Trolley Bags are a system of four reusable shopping bags that can be rolled together to carry to the supermarket and hung over the trolley while shopping, and then spread across the trolley to pack groceries into the bags with two hands free.
- Each bag is sturdy and designed to be long-lasting. The netting is made from the same material as baby travel cots, making them stronger than most re-usable shopping bags.
- The bags environmentally friendly and convenient alternative to plastic bags.
- They are available online around the world, and you can find all the stock lists over at TrolleyBags.com
Using them
1. Take bags to the shop and hang on the hook near the handle or place in the child seat so it’s easy to pull out when ready. Unload groceries at check out as usual, and when trolley is empty, unroll the bags and slide them across the trolley (the blue bag sits at the end).
2. Place items in the sectioned bags. The colour codes work well for different things. Generally speaking, I used the red for meat, blue for cold, orange for general and green for fruit and veggies.
3. Lift bags out of trolley and straight into the car.
4. Carry groceries inside.
5. Once groceries are unloaded, roll the bags back up and keep in the car (so you don’t forget to use them).
It’s a great system, and it certainly works better for me than using loose reusable bags. I’ve noted below some pros and considerations.
Pros
- Environmentally friendly
- Holds heaps of groceries. I shop for our family of six, which amounts to over $200 in groceries and there is still room to spare (and that includes an 18 pack of toilet paper)
- Groceries are less likely to roll around in the car
- User friendly – there is velcro to attach the bags together, and they easily roll up and secure into a bag. Great design.
- Portable
- Really sturdy
- Sectioning helps with sorting different food items
Considerations
- Because the bags are big (especially the orange one) they fit a lot of things, which is awesome, but they can be quite heavy when transporting inside the house.
- You need an empty trolley to store the bags in for packing. This is fine, but if you have a lot of groceries (like I often do) and the check out attendant can’t bag them until the trolley is empty, there is a huge backlog. I suggest getting a second trolley ready when you’re at the check out, putting the bags in ready. They could be given to the attendant, but they aren’t the usual size of reusable bags but still, that is an option. At places like Aldi where you pack your own bags anyway, I would get another trolley after paying for the groceries, and then sorting the items from one trolley to the packing/sectioned trolley (Aldi moves too fast to organise them in the trolley bags at the time, unless you’re happy just to throw them in randomly – ha).
Trolley Bags are a clever product: good design, useful and encourages less plastic bag waste.
This is a review post. See my review policy here.
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