Lidl Ireland Sparks Conversations Around Sustainability Among School Children to Celebrate Launch of New Quirky Recycled Shopping Bags

To celebrate the announcement of Lidl Ireland’s new range of 100% recycled plastic shopping bags, the retailer is calling on young creatives across the country to exercise their imaginations and submit a drawing of what one of the R’s of Sustainability means to them, whether that be reduce, reuse or recycle. The retailer hopes this colouring competition will spark important conversations around the over-reliance on plastic and to re-think how it is used.  

Entrants are encouraged to interpret the R’s of Sustainability in their own way and Lidl encourages creatives to take inspiration from all around them; whether you create a drawing based on reusing egg containers as seed pots or regrow your garden into a haven for bees and butterflies, the creative possibilities are endless!

To be in with a chance to win, you can pick up a colouring competition entry form in any Lidl store across the country from Monday 25^th January or you can download the form at www.lidl.ie/shopping-bags and print it off at home. To submit your masterpiece, you can take a picture of it and upload it to the competition’s webpage. The retailer will then choose four winners from across the country who will see their drawings brought to life on Lidl’s new recycled shopping bag range, giving customers in all 208 stores the choice of different limited edition bag designs and also a friendly but constant reminder of the importance of reusing the bags. The four winners will also receive a €500 Lidl gift card.

The opposite side of the bag to the competition winners’ designs will feature quirky puns around the reusability of the new bags, including “Lettuce all reuse our bags”, “A reused bag is so appealing” and “You’re butter off reusing this bag”. These puntastic designs were selected by Lidl colleagues through an internal vote.

This move is part of Lidl’s A Better Tomorrow sustainability strategy set out by the retailer in 2018 under its Plastic Pledge commitments which include eliminating single use plastics, using 20% less plastic packaging by 2022 and having 100% recyclable own-brand packaging by 2025. The theme of the competition is also aligned with Lidl’s REset Plastic approach which focuses on Reduce, Redesign, Recycle, Remove and Research.

The launch of Lidl’s new recycled shopping bags will see 6.3 million ‘Bags for Life’ eliminated from circulation by May 2021. ‘Bags for Life’ are reusable shopping bags made from plastic which, although are meant to be an environmentally friendlier alternative to single-use plastic bags, can often have a large environmental footprint as they are frequently not reused. Lidl is the first retailer in Ireland to only offer heavy-duty plastic bags which are made from 100% recycled plastic. The new reusable bags are more durable (and stylish!) than ever, leaving customers with no excuse not to reuse them!

The four winners will be announced later in the year and Lidl customers will be able to purchase these exclusive limited-edition designs in all 208 stores across the country from September 2021.

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Notes 

1. The recycled plastic used to make Lidl’s new durable shopping bags is made from recycled plastic from Lidl stores across Europe.
2. Four winners will be selected across Ireland and Northern Ireland and their drawing will be printed on one side of Lidl’s new recycled shopping bags. The final design which appears on the bag may be a modification of the submission depending on image quality and bag manufacturer printer requirements. Each winner will also receive a €500 Lidl gift card.  
3. Full details and terms and conditions can be found at www.lidl.ie/shopping-bags