The Space-Saving Hack For Storing All Those Reusable Shopping Bags

If there's one thing almost every adult in the United States has in common, it's a secret stash of dozens of reusable shopping bags. Even in the shrinking areas where plastic bags are still available, many people still opt for high-quality reusable bags from Amazon, which are also notorious for taking up space. Since they're a part of daily life, the best way to handle an overabundance of reusable bags is to use storage techniques that give them a low profile.

Though there's an abundance of bins, bags, and boxes available to wrangle your bag collection, your folding game is actually the most important part of getting your reusable bags under control. Obviously, simply shoving them into a storage area would not only leave them crumpled and possibly compromise their structural integrity, but also takes up the most room. Laying them flat and folding them in half is much more efficient and allows you to fold them inside each other, so you can grab a handful of them at once.

If you're really strapped for storage space, however, the best folding technique is the one that will make each bag as small as possible. By folding the sides of the flattened bag toward each other until it creates a thin strip, then folding that strip up from the bottom into a small rectangle, the bag will take up no more space than a pack of index cards. You can even slide the straps over the folded bag to hold it closed.

The best thing about folding your reusable shopping bags into these tiny little rectangles is that you can store dozens of them together in a spare eco-friendly bag or a plastic bin in your kitchen. However, giving them such a low profile may tempt you to tuck them into the back of your pantry. This not only makes them hard to access, it can activate an "out of sight out of mind" mentality, where you forget that you have an abundance of bags and accidentally purchase more.

Folded or not, it's important to keep these bags where you'll remember to grab a few on your way out the door. If you have more than you regularly use, you might store spares folded as described in a basket or box near your entryway for grocery shopping trips to spare you headaches after a vacation. Meanwhile, your favorites can hang on a hook near your keys. If they break or get lost, you can replace them with the spares folded nearby.

Something else to consider is that grocery stores are germy places, and the packaging protecting your food can easily transfer microbes to the inside of your bags. That's why not cleaning your bags regularly is a dangerous habit, especially if you fold them, which locks in moisture and allows germs to breed. Cleaning them with an antibacterial wipe or spray prevents this, keeping you healthy and safe.