“A Bag’s Life” Seeks Creative Ideas on Second-life Uses for Plastic Bags

Got a creative idea about recycling and a video camera? That’s all it takes if you’re a high school student in Virginia and want a chance to win up to $1000 in a video contest going on now thru March 1.

Sponsored by “A Bag’s Life,” the contest invites students to break out their cameras and their creativity to make a one-to-two-minute video showing ways to recycle and reuse free plastic shopping bags like those available from grocery and retail stores. You don’t have to be a filmmaking pro to enter, but all material must be original, including images and music.

'A Bag's Life' is an awareness campaign to encourage reduce, recycle and reuse of free plastic bags and materials like dry cleaning and bread bags, and the wraps on items like paper towels or cases of bottled water. It helps make recycling easier with an interactive website (www.abagslife.com ) that lets users find a recycling drop-off location by zip code. Demonstrating what public and private groups can accomplish by working together, A Bag's Life is a cooperative effort of Keep Virginia Beautiful, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, the Virginia Retail Federation, Trex, Virginia Recycling Association, HR Clean and the Progressive Bag Affiliates of the American Chemistry Council.

Students are encouraged to have some fun with the subject and check out the website www.abagslife.com  to see what others did with “the bag” in a recent Florida contest. Winning entries included a music video about a boy and his “bag” best friend and a mock news report about bags going on a worldwide strike.

“When making the videos, students should keep in mind how easy it is in Virginia to recycle bags by taking them back to participating grocers and retailers,” said Mike Baum, executive director of Keep Virginia Beautiful, a sponsor partner of the contest. “And they should also know that one of the biggest users of recycled bags is actually based in Winchester, Virginia. The company, Trex, recycles plastic bags and wood chips into decking and fences. These are the kind of things A Bag’s Life is trying to raise awareness about – how to reuse them, of course, but also how they are recycled and the kinds of products that can be made from bags.” 

A student or group can enter a video in the Recycle or Reuse category on the website. Each category will award prizes to first ($1ꯠ), second ($500) and third place ($300), with a total of six prizes awarded.

“Imagination is key.  Don’t be afraid to make it fun,” said Baum. “Rap about reuse; create a how-to-recycle animated short; do a song about the things that get made out of recycled bags.  Record a treasure hunt for all the other films, bags and wraps that can get recycled along with shopping bags.”

All videos must be submitted by March 1, and then judges will select up to 20 videos for upload to the website. Online voting will take place March 9 to April 3 and winners will be announced April 8.

Additional Links:
Become a fan on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/A-Bags-Life
Follow A Bag's Life on Twitter: http://twitter.com/abagslife
Sign up for the new HR Green blog: http://hrgreenblog.com