Observations:
1. Most customers bring their bags and often buy more than the volume of those bags.
2. A lot of customers have bags and leave them at home or in their cars. They won't buy our store bags every time they come shopping as they already have 20.
3. A notable number of customers refuse to get bags and put their items either in a plastic basket or in their carts.
4. Our store loses a heck of a lot of plastic baskets as the customers take them to their cars and instead of transferring their items to their vehicles, they simply place the full baskets into their backseats and don't return the baskets rather than returning them to the store. That's $8.00 a pop. We've easily lost $8,000, if not more. Management and security don't insist on leaving the baskets in the store. We're regularly running out of baskets.
5. We lose money as well with the carts. A customer buying 10+ items and putting them in the cart just walks out of the store. Security doesn't check the sales receipts. Management doesn't want us to put "Paid Stickers" on each item. Stickers are saved for big-ticket items like meat and liquor. We've caught rogue "customers" who load up their carts with liquor and meat and push their carts out to their cars without paying.
6. I try to walk around no-bags issue by packing groceries in empty wine boxes to keep the baskets in the store. (I know, I know. Security still doesn't check the receipts with what's in the boxes or their bags.)