The United States consumes 100 - 300 billion plastic bags each year. 

It will be interesting to see whether recent bans on plastic bags, like the one enacted in San Francisco last spring, will lower the demand on non-degradable bags and force smaller manufacturers to consolidate, go out of business, or create a different product (hopefully that does not use petroleum!).

A few more facts about bags (from reusablebags.com):

• Plastic bags are among the 12 items of debris most often found in coastal cleanups, according to the nonprofit Center for Marine Conservation
• Plastic bags take up to 1,000 years to degrade in a landfill
• Four of five grocery bags in the US are plastic
• 1 trillion bags are consumed each year world wide 

While the grocery bag climate is moving away from plastic to paper or canvas, Kendra Stanley is taking it one step further by using recycled rain jackets to create a waterproof nylon bag.

You can either:
• send me your old rain jacket and I will make you a bag,
• use my pattern and make your own bag, or
• buy a bag from me made out of a rain jacket