I was shopping at a grocery store and a lady saw me visible distraught by not being able to open a clear bag and she told me to touch some of the produce I’m about to pick up or the moisture around them. Never had the problem again. Thank you, random lady!
One of our local grocery stores has a different brand of plastic bag, This one has a small adhesive spot between the layers near the opening of the bags. As you pull the bag off, the adhesive pulls the next bag open a little bit. Each bag is slightly open when you pull it off. It works surprisingly well.
I may try to suggest that the other grocery stores adopt this brand but they are big national chains and I doubt they would be interested.
for reference, this bag says
PULL-N-PAK®
Titan Supreme
28-2024-11-2
www.crownpoly.com
I've seen several different solutions to this problem over the decades, and they all have one thing in common: they quickly get value-engineered out of existence.
There's always a fraction of a cent to be saved by adding slightly less adhesive, using slightly cheaper plastic, replacing the perforating tool less often, etc.; couple iterations in, the solution stops working reliably. There's no back pressure, because it's not like anyone is choosing where they shop by whether the single-use plastic bags are easy to open.
Rubbing the opening side of the bag between your palms generates static and opens it too. Learned that from a meat department employee who saw me struggling one day.
I used to do that too. But now the plastic bags are gone and there is these paper bags with slightly offset edges att he opening. Really neat invention, why didn't we do that before? :-)
