Dear mummy, now that the UK has introduced the 5p plastic bag charge at tills you are on the look out for decent shopping bags that can be used over and over again. You first saw these Trolley Bags advertised last year on social media, and thought they looked great, much better than the supermarket bags and reusable expensive canvas bags. So when the opportunity came up to review and test these Trolley Bags we ALL jumped at the chance, it sounded like a great, practical invention. As a toddler I love trying out bags and often find myself in canvas shopping bags hiding from my folks or wanting to be carried! When the Trolley Bags arrived in a big brown box through the post we were all intrigued by the size. *I was secretly thinking Ooooo I can fit in one of those!*

So what are Trolley Bags?

Instead of individual bags that you take shopping, Trolley Bags are a system of four reusable shopping bags that can be rolled together, velcroed together and are a complete portable trolley packing system. They fit perfectly into your trolley leaving two hands free to pack, great for when you have a mad toddler trying to help! Each bag is sturdy and designed to be long-lasting and are made from the same netting material as baby travel cots – that’s strong stuff! We tested out the Express Trolley Bags intended for smaller food shops with smaller trolleys. You can also get the larger ones for the big trolleys too. We love the pastel colours they come in, but would have loved to see a pink in there somewhere. (Maybe as a future promotional pack?) As a small family we want to be more environmentally friendly and Trolley Bags will discourage us from buying more plastic bags and help speed up shopping trips.

How we use Trolley Bags

1. We took our Trolley Bags to the shop and hung them on the trolley hook near the handle until we were ready to use them. They are lightweight, portable and user-friendly – there is velcro on each bag to secure together and they easily roll up.

2. We did our food shop and unloaded our groceries at check out as usual, and when trolley was empty we unrolled the bags and slid them across the trolley. The Express Trolley Bags fit perfectly in a small shopping trolley (the ones we use for a small shop). When it came to testing out the Trolley Bags at the checkout we weren’t sure how much quicker we’d be. However it made organising and packing a joy! Usually it’s a mad scramble to get food items into our plastic bags and everything gets squashed as we try to race the cashier and keep up with the scanning pace. We kept up with the cashier this time and didn’t have a mad rush at the end to finish packing.

3. I helped my folks place items in the sectioned bags. We all helped together which was a first! Sectioning helps with sorting different food items and I was happy to take instruction from my parents and help pack (this couldn’t have been done with plain white bags as they were shouting out the colours to me) We used the largest bag (No.4) nearest to the handle for bottles of drink, tins and heavy items. The smallest bag (No.1) on the other end for fragile items. The coloured bags have numbers on them too which is a good reminder of the order when putting them in the trolley. It was much quicker to pack our shopping straight into the bags in the trolley rather than having a big pile of reusable bags to sort through. Rather than having to hold the bag open with one hand and pack with the other we were “hands free”.

4. My folks lifted the bags out of trolley individually and straight into the car. They found that the groceries were less likely to topple over and roll around in the car as the netting kept everything secure. When we got home there were no fallen bags with shopping all over the place, they all remained upright and kept the shopping in tact.

5. They were great to carry our groceries inside as they hand thick sturdy handles, which was good as they did become quite heavy with only four bags to do all the shopping.

6. Once our groceries were unloaded we rolled the bags back up to keep them in the boot of the car (so we wouldn’t forget to use them again). It’s a great packing system, and it certainly works better for us than using loose reusable bags which are kept all over the place! One thing we would like to see is the option of having cardboard inserts to make the bottom of the netted bags flat, as it would make standing items up easier when packing.

With an RRP of £17.99 my folks definitely think these bags are great value for money, we just need to remember to keep them in the boot of the car on food shop days. They are available online and you can find all the stockists over at TrolleyBags.com

Love Bella xx

Disclosure: We received the product in order to write an honest review.