Over the past few months I’ve noticed a few shops in Canberra no longer charging for plastic bags - Target, The Reject Shop and IGA are the main ones. Coles and Woolworths still charge for plastic bags.
Are they conventional plastic bags, or are they like those heavier multi-use plastic bags which are sold at Aldi?
They aren’t like the ALDI ones, but they are thicker than the free bags at Coles and Woolworths in NSW. The IGA bags I’ve got are made from recycled plastic.
They may be more than 35 microns in thickness. Woolworths pulled that one on in the Northern Territory with bags which looked exactly like regular plastic bags, but a bit thicker.
The Age has an interesting article on Australia’s first-ever store consisting only of vending machines, which opened at St Kilda in Melbourne last December. The machines sell vitamins, perfumes, mobile phone accessories, bandages, medicine and Coca-Cola with more products to come.
I think it’s just a gimmick and will not become a trend like those vending machines only stores in Japan.
Hot Cross bun varieties seen yesterday
Chocolate, chocolate Chip, plain (fruit), no fruit, apple and cinnamon - seem to be very popular with not many left in some flavours.
I reckon it will take off - it makes a lot of sense to locate these in PT hotspots, reasonably cheap to run and don’t require a lot of space in already congested locations
If they sold baby formula in vending machines, they’d be absolutely raking it in.
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I remember the coffee vending machines on Sydney railway stations in the 1970s/1980s that were dirty, dodgy, and the coffee tasted horrific. But I still got the odd coffee if I needed a hot drink on a cold winter night. These days McDonald’s is a better option.
Chocolate are the best IMO. Apple and Cinnamon seem to be new this year.
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The sticky date and caramel ones they had a few years ago were pretty great.
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i got a coffee from a vending machine at a hospital the other morning. bloody hell it was bad… tasted like mud
It doesn’t surprise me in that article that it mentions that Fitzroy street is in decline - that area is absolutely disgusting these days. I always wondered why there are always so many junkies on the street there, then I watched a documentary the other day that mentioned Gatwick House. That whole area is just gross and I try to avoid.
Speaking of shopping areas in decline - what happened to Bridge Road in Melbourne? I went down there yesterday and I swear half the stores there have now shut down and it’s a ghost down compared to what it used to be a few years ago. Even the little shopping centre where the Coles is nearly every shop in there is abandoned or shut. I even notice a section of shops have been sold off for apartments. A few years ago that was another booming shopping area known for factory outlet and discount stores. Completely dead these days.
I remember the traders complained about the new kerbside tram stops on Bridge Road which makes the road even narrower and reduces the number of on-street parking spaces. That partly contributes to the decline.
Saw Chocolate Easter Eggs, Rabbits and a Chocolate Bilby in Woolies this morning.
Yeah true that’s probably a part of it but parking was never that great there. There were a couple of big car parks in the streets behind you could pay to park but one of them now looks like apartments are being built on it so there is no hope for the area. Probably needs a few bars and more food places along there to get people back. In comparison I notice how much more Swan street in Richmond is booming more than a few years ago (as a food/bar type area).
Allphones the latest company to go into administration.
Four fashion brands have gone into administration: Marcs and David Lawrence last Wednesday (February 1), Sydney suitmakers Herringbone and Rhodes & Beckett today. Really a bad time for the fashion retail sector.
Squeezed by foreign import giants Zara, H&M, Topshop and Uniqlo.
Not really surprised by this as most of these brands are very high end and expensive. Herringbone shirts alone can cost $250-$300. They are really great shirts but the brand name isn’t big enough to justify that price.
I don’t know if it’s just an age thing but I seem to shop mostly at the same stores/brands these days when it comes to clothing/fashion. I used to love shopping and browsing stores for hours but these days I know the brands I like and pretty much only shop at those stores (plus knowing their sizing etc makes it easy to shop for them online too).