I ran through the drive through at McDonald's yesterday for breakfast. There was no milk in the house, no waffles, no yogurt. We were even out of peanut butter. Since I didn't think dry cereal or an apple would cut it for a nutritious breakfast I decided we'd just do the quick and easy thing and then go grocery shopping in the afternoon.
My son had the hotcakes and sausage. I had an Egg McMuffin; and I ordered a fruit 'n yogurt parfait for my daughter. At the last minute I threw in a cinnamon melts for my son because he was starving at this point.
We paid and pulled up to the next window to get our food. I was handed their little mini shopping bag, which is the only thing the hotcakes and sausage fits in. Then I was handed a bag with my Egg McMuffin. Then I was handed a bag with the fruit 'n yogurt parfait. And lastly, you guessed it--a bag with the cinnamon melts. Four bags for four items. All of which would have fit in the mini shopping bag.
With all the talk of "Going Green" in this country, it kind of kills me that this sort of waste goes on. In the spirit of fairness I just went out to my car and grabbed one of the bags (three of which are now stowed in the pocket of my car door). It says that it is made out of a "minimum of 40% post-consumer recycled paper." So that's something.
A while back I used to try and get my food without the bags. The look that I would get when I would say "I don't need a bag with that" was usually one of confusion or incredulousness. "Huh?"
"Can you just give me the hamburger?"
I think it is great that the employees are so well-trained and all, really. But after a while I felt bad when I held the line up so much; and these days we don't go to McDonald's much so I kind of gave up on it.
Can you imagine the amount of trees that would be saved if every time you went to a fast-food restaurant and ordered an item they just handed you that wrapped taco, hamburger or personal-pan pizza and skipped the bag?
I understand if you are ordering a lot of items to-go then you may want a bag.
But when I am going through the drive-through rather than being asked if I want fries with that, I'd rather be asked "Do you want a bag with that?"